"All possibilities are necessarily actualized"

[EduChris]

Consider the following hypothesis:

"Any and all possibilities are necessarily actualized in some or another universe(s) within an infinite omniverse"

Does this represent a parsimonious hypothesis, or a profligate one?

[Filthy Tugboat]

...Volition as a causal mechanism is not necessarily a being...

I do not claim that volition is necessarily "a being" in the sense that we might understand the term.

OK.

...and decisions are not necessarily made...

If our intuitions are correct, it seems that volition is not the same as necessity or chance. Either I agree with you here, or else I do not understand your point. If you are saying that decisions are optional, rather than necessary, I would argue that some decisions might be optional and some might be necessary.

Fair enough.

...epistemology...would perform the same role with or without volition...

Objectively, epistemology is whatever it is regardless of our subjective thoughts. However, if we stipulate that we have no volition, then we necessarily must follow the consequences of that stipulation wherever it leads. Our normal understanding of the nature and purpose and point of epistemology cannot surive if we stipulate away our status as volitional agents.

Why not?

As volitional subjects, we are the inscribers; as non-volitional objects, we are the inscription. The inscription has no ability to second-guess the inscriber (for if otherwise, the inscription would be an inscriber).

Pretty much.

The situation is analogous to a marriage. Suppose you married the most wonderful, loving woman in the world. Everything was perfect, and you had never been happier. Then suppose you discovered some proof that your marriage was a sham, that your wife married you as a clever ruse to gain access to some industrial or government secrets, that she was just pretending to love you in order to realize her mercenary objectives. I think you are claiming that the marriage remains the same either way--it is what it is and what it was and what it will be--regardless of whether you know the truth or not. My claim is that the sham marriage is not a marriage at all, for the very nature and purpose and meaning of the relationship have been hopelessly undermined.

I don't really think that this analogy is accurate.

...we have a will, even if that will necessarily follows a strict path, we still have will/volition...

Any volition entirely subject to determinism would be an illusion. However, there is no way even in principle for us to demonstrate that all volition is in fact an illusion of prior necessity.

We also have no way even in principle to determine that true volition actually exists.

...How would the situation be absurd?...

We would have stipulated away the most real thing we have: our subjective inner thought life. Our stipulation leaves us with no other option than to suppose we are an inscription, rather than an inscriber. But there is simply no empirical evidence which could support such a state of affairs, for if we give up volition, we would not be able to trust the mental thoughts in our heads that interpreted whatever empirical evidence there was that caused us to suppose we lacked volition.

Why would we not be able to trust the mental thoughts in our heads? Why would our subjective inner thought life be compromised?

Going back to the marriage analogy, suppose that as soon as you discovered "proof" of your wife's conspiracy, your psychologist called you and told you that he had received some test results back, and he was diagnosing you as chemically imbalanced so as to be susceptible to believing all manner of conspiracy theories. Given that diagnosis, how would you ever know whether your marriage was real or sham? And how would you know that your wife hadn't paid your psychologist to render that (epistemologically confounding) diagnosis, so as to give her more time to fully exploit her covert operation?

I still don't really see this analogy as accurate, or useful.

[EduChris]

...Our normal understanding of the nature and purpose and point of epistemology cannot surive if we stipulate away our status as volitional agents.

Why not?...

I have already explained why this is the case, and McCulluch (a non-theist) agrees with me against you. If you think our normal understanding of epistemology survives the loss of genuine consciousness, reason, and volition, then we are at an impasse--unless you want to grant the point for sake of further argument (which I doubt you will do, since it will result in the collapse of non-theism as an expistemically justified explanation for anything).

[Filthy Tugboat]

...Our normal understanding of the nature and purpose and point of epistemology cannot surive if we stipulate away our status as volitional agents.

Why not?...

I have already explained why this is the case, and McCulluch (a non-theist) agrees with me against you. If you think our normal understanding of epistemology survives the loss of genuine consciousness, reason, and volition, then we are at an impasse--unless you want to grant the point for sake of further argument (which I doubt you will do, since it will result in the collapse of non-theism as an expistemically justified explanation for anything).

Correct, granting it here would essentially be the end of the debate anyway. It is only volition that I am arguing may not exist. I suppose we must agree to disagree then. It's been fun, we should do this again sometime.