Could we have made different choices than the ones we actually made?

[Compassionist]

Could we have made different choices than the ones we actually made? By "we" I mean all living things. For example, I have a potted plant that has tilted westward by twenty degrees. Could the plant have refrained from tilting or tilted at a different direction by a different degree or was it inevitable that it tilted westward by twenty degrees? I ate porridge for breakfast today. Could I have eaten something else or was eating porridge for breakfast inevitable? Nelson Mandela died on 14 June 1999. Was his death on that date inevitable or could he have died at a younger or older age? Albert Einstein was a physicist. Could he have been a professional football player instead of a physicist or was his choice of career inevitable? In your response, please explain how you know what you know.

[fredonly]

[Replying to Compassionist in post #1]

This thread seemed to quickly accept that determinism is true and then moved on to what would follow from that. But I want to get back to the starting point. I saw two reasons offered for this conclusion:

1. We couldn’t have made different “choices” because no one has proven we can make different choices

2. We couldn’t have made different “choices” because it’s been proven that we couldn’t have made different “choices”

If one believes (1) alone, this would lead to agnosticism, not determinism. And (2) isn’t actual support, it just says there is support. Can someone give the actual support for determinism being true?

Start with the question of whether or not determinism is true. There's strong evidence that it is true: the success of science at making predictions in the physical world.

The question then becomes: does our mental decision-making process (which intuition suggests employs "free will"), prove determinism false? It does not. So determinists and physicalists are justified in denying free will.

Someone who denies determinism on the basis of free will is on shaky grounds, since there's no basis for believing free will actually exists (mere possibility is inadequate to justify a belief).

On the other hand, a theist may believe in free-will because it's part of his faith. Such faith is not rationally justified, therefore his belief in free-will has an irrational basis.

My conclusion: although it's possible we have free-will, the most rational position is to deny its existence.

[The Tanager]

Start with the question of whether or not determinism is true. There's strong evidence that it is true: the success of science at making predictions in the physical world.

Could you explain this more? Why is the success of science strong evidence that determinism is true?

[marke]

Could we have made different choices than the ones we actually made? By "we" I mean all living things. For example, I have a potted plant that has tilted westward by twenty degrees. Could the plant have refrained from tilting or tilted at a different direction by a different degree or was it inevitable that it tilted westward by twenty degrees? I ate porridge for breakfast today. Could I have eaten something else or was eating porridge for breakfast inevitable? Nelson Mandela died on 14 June 1999. Was his death on that date inevitable or could he have died at a younger or older age? Albert Einstein was a physicist. Could he have been a professional football player instead of a physicist or was his choice of career inevitable? In your response, please explain how you know what you know.

God gives humans the freedom to make both good and bad choices that God does not make for them.