Recently, in an interview with the Sean Carroll New York Times, physicist Sean Carroll dismissed free will. Neurosurgeon Michael Egnor explains why that means dismissing logic as well:
Michael Egnor: If we accepted his argument for materialism, we would have to stop believing in it—a curious, self-refuting result.
Logic is, of course, a massive discipline in itself and it has one striking characteristic: Logic shares no commonality with physics. That is, the Venn diagram of logic and the Venn diagram of physics don’t overlap in any way. Mathematical logic is entirely separate from mathematical physics. You can’t derive modus ponens: from Newton’s law of gravitation, and you can’t derive Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem from the equations of general relativity. If Carroll is right that man is governed entirely by the laws of physics, without remainder, then where do the laws of logic come from?
A materialist might argue (vaguely) that the laws of logic are just epiphenomenal vapor from our physical brains. But that can’t account for logic. If a brain state represents logic, then logic must exist in some way independently of the brain state because representation presupposes that which it represents. A map presupposes that which is mapped. And if logic is not represented by a brain state, but is merely another kind of brain state, then logic can’t exist if brain states are entirely governed by physical laws — which in themselves contain no logic.
Michael Egnor, “Physicist rejects free will—and thus fails logic” at Mind Matters News
This is not an excellent time to be a materialist. Materialism is losing its Cool. It’s not even making sense.
More by neurosurgeon Michael Egnor on free will:
How Libet’s free will research is misrepresented: Sometimes, says Michael Egnor, misrepresentation may be deliberate because Libet’s work doesn’t support a materialist perspective.
Does “alien hand syndrome” show that we don’t really have free will? One woman’s left hand seemed to have a mind of its own. Did it?
and
Does brain stimulation research challenge free will? If we can be forced to want something, is the will still free?
If absolute free will is conceived of as the ability to make choices that are not influenced by external factors, then the only way that could be possible is for an individual to be entirely detached from both their present environment and their history. Otherwise, once you admit external influences on the choices we make, the question becomes one of to what extent we can be said to have free will and even do we have free will at all?
The story from the Bible of Peter’s triple denial of knowing Jesus, true or not, illustrates the point. If an omniscient being, such as the Christian God, knows something to be the case then that is the case whether it is in our past or present or future. That is what omniscience must mean. Whether God decided that is what would happen is irrelevant. What God knows, is.
Thus, as we know from the story, even though Jesus specifically warned Peter in advance of what would happen and even though Peter clearly believed he would not do it – feeling, as we all feel, that he had a choice in the matter – nonetheless, what Jesus foretold came to pass. So Egnor’s own Bible – not atheist materialists – provides strong evidence that he is wrong concerning free will.
Sev
No need to go on, because no one believes free will is “absolute.” Everyone understands that all people are subject to various influences that impinge, sometimes very strongly, on their ability to choose a particular action (ask any addict). The Bible does not suggest otherwise. Indeed, the Bible states very clearly just the opposite.
Why is Seversky so interested in the Bible in this particular situation? Egnor is arguing from physics and logic. Can we address that?
I think this is very relevant to the topic please you should all read, this was written by Sean Carroll
https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2011/07/13/free-will-is-as-real-as-baseball/
Mathematical logic provides the formal basis of the whole of mathematics. So Egnor is essentially arguing that mathematical physics doesn’t use mathematics.
@News
@3
Seversky has a fiddle with only one string.
Bob O’H at 5 states,
No, he is not. Here is the full context of what he said,
He is clearly saying that Mathematical logic precedes Mathematical physics and thus you cannot derive Mathematical logic from Mathematical physics.
Stephen Hawking himself admitted as much when he stated, “questions always persist that can neither be proved nor disproved on the basis of the axioms that define the system.”
As to free will and “the axioms that define the system”,,, “Human mathematicians are able to create axioms, but a computer program cannot do this without violating information conservation. Creating new axioms and free will are shown to be different aspects of the same phenomena: the creation of new information.”
Moreover, on top of that, the Kochen-Specker theorem undermines the determinism of atheistic materialists in the most fundamental way possible in that “it would not even be possible to place the information into the universe’s past in an ad hoc way”, because, “the result of any individual measurement of spin was not fixed (pre-determined) independently of the choice of measurements.”
As Anton Zeilinger states, “what we perceive as reality now depends on our earlier decision what to measure. Which is a very, very, deep message about the nature of reality and our part in the whole universe. We are not just passive observers.”
As well, Anton Zeilinger and company, as of 2018, pushed the ‘free will loophole’ back to 7.8 billion years ago, thereby firmly establishing the ‘common sense’ fact that the free will choices of the experimenter in the quantum experiments are truly free and are not determined by any possible causal influences from the past for at least the last 7.8 billion years, and that the experimenters themselves are therefore shown to be truly free to choose whatever measurement settings in the experiments that he or she may so desire to choose so as to ‘logically’ probe whatever aspect of reality that he or she may be interested in probing.
This puts the deniers of free will, i.e. Determinists, i.e. Darwinian materialists, in a very awkward situation in regards to the experimental science itself.
Basically the Determinist and/or Darwinian materialist must now claim that “a particle detector’s settings may “conspire” with events in the shared causal past of the detectors themselves to determine which properties of the particle to measure.”
In other words, instead of believing what the experimental results of quantum mechanics are actually telling us, the Determinist, and/or Darwinian materialist, is now forced to claim that the results of the experiments were somehow ‘superdetermined’ at least 7.8 billion years ago and are now ‘fooling us’ into believing that our experimental results in quantum theory are trustworthy and correct.
Sabine Hosenfelder herself, instead of accepting the experimental results from quantum mechanics that show we have free will, has instead opted to say that events in the remote past, prior to the formation of the earth itself, were somehow ‘superdetermined’ and moreover, these ‘superdetermined’ events somehow ‘conspired’ to ‘fool us’ into erroneously believing our experimental results that show us that quantum theory is correct..
To call such a move on the part of Sabine Hossenfelder, (i.e. the rejection of experimental results that conflict with her apriori philosophical belief, namely her philosophical belief in ‘determinism’), unscientific would be a severe understatement. It is a rejection of the entire scientific method itself. She, in her appeal to ‘superdeterminism’, is basically arguing that we cannot trust what the experimental results of quantum mechanics themselves are telling us because events in the remote past ‘conspired’ to give us erroneous experimental results today.
As should be needless to say, if we cannot trust what our experimental results are telling us, then science is, for all practical purposes, dead.
Bob O’H @5
Further to Ba77 above, consider the following analogy:
Draw a Venn diagram of 1) elements in the periodic table and 2) man-made vehicles. The two do not overlap – you cannot ride Nickel to work, and Segway isn’t an element. This is not to say that #1 is not REQUIRED for #2 – just that, in terms of classification, they don’t overlap.*
This is Egnor’s point, and why Carroll’s deterministic philosophy fails. Carroll is attempting to ride his (material) physics Segway while denying the existence of the (immaterial) elemental logic that provides its foundation. You have merely restated Egnor, not refuted him.
* Egnor equivalents being 1) a=b and b=c, so a=c, and 2) F=ma – each equation can be Venn diagrammed in either Logic or Physics, but no single equation belongs in both.
Right, except that if A proceeds from B then A and B are not “entirely separate”. There is a definite relation between them.
Bob O’H @9,
I see what you’re saying, but Egnor provides the necessary context for the term “entirely separate”, and how he is classifying the two for Venn purposes, with the immediately following statement:
(Edit: see my previous analogy for how things can be entirely separate in terms of Venn classification, yet still have a relationship).
Just because our choices are INFLUENCED by external forces does not mean we don’t have free will.
And again, perhaps Jesus was telling Peter to deny he knows Jesus because Jesus knew the trouble Peter would be in.
drc466 – OK, but Venn diagrammes aren’t directional, and my point is that he’s only looking in one direction. By doing that, his argument comes across as absurd.
Bob O’H
I strongly disagree, but anyways, for the sake of argument, as absurd as what? As absurd as say Coyne claiming that we have a choice to believe whether or not free will is an illusion?
Or perhaps as absurd as Dennett claiming that ‘nobody is conscious … we are all zombies’?
Or perhaps as absurd as Darwinists claiming that our beliefs about reality are unreliable and then being absolutely certain in that particular belief that our beliefs about reality are unreliable?
Or perhaps as absurd as a Darwinist claiming that our perceptions about reality are completely illusory and therefore completely unreliable and yet still being certain that his perceptions were reliable enough in order for him to draw that inference?
Or perhaps as absurd as a Darwinist claiming that we live in a universe that is completely amoral, i.e. a universe of ‘blind pitiless, indifference’, and yet then he becomes a raging moralist at the drop of a hat when it comes to his beliefs about almighty God?
Bob, I’m just trying to get a feel for just how absurd you think Egnor’s argument actually is.
Put another way Bob. on a hypothetical Venn diagram of absurd arguments, is Egnor’s argument more or less absurd than the arguments that have been, and are, put forward by Darwinists?
Sooooooooo I posted on Sean Carroll’s essay of free will which is totally contrary to what he is saying now, i mean that’s what this topic was about, his view on free will right? So he is contradicting himself, if so what does his opinion on the subject even matter?
Bob O’H,
I’d dispute your point, but your point makes no sense to me. How is Egnor coming at this “from one direction”? He is simply making the following points:
1) True or False: Some mathematical equations/theorems express logic (e.g. if a=b, then b=a). T
2) True or False: Some mathematical equations/theorems describe material/physical laws (e.g. e=mc^2). T
3) True or False: There is no mathematical equation/theorem that falls into both category 1 and category 2 (e.g. logic doesn’t demand W=F*d). T
4) True or False: Category 1 math describes reality independent of Category 2 math, and is not definable using Category 2 math. T
5) True or False: Any philosophy that presupposes Category 2 math is sufficient to describe all reality fails due to Item #4. T
Independent of the game of semantics around the definition of “Venn diagram” and “overlap” you are trying to play, which point above do you claim is invalid?
drc466 – you utterly fail at 3. That’s how mathematical modelling works. Kepler’s laws described planetary motion. They can be derived, logically, from Newton’s laws of planetary motion.
The whole point of using maths to describe physical systems is that you can use the logical framework of mathematics to derive new theories.
What’s even the point of using mathematics to describe physical systems if we can’t use mathematial logic to derive new statements from our models? What’s the alternative?
Hmmm, Bob claims,
But Einstein’s general relativity cannot be derived logically from Newton’s laws, In fact it required an entirely new mathematical framework of non-Euclidean geometry. i.e. 4-D spacetime. Go figure!
Bob also claims:
Really? And yet as Weinberg, an atheist, stated to Richard Dawkins, “”I don’t think one should underestimate the fix we are in. That in the end we will not be able to explain the world. That we will have some set of laws of nature (that) we will not be able to derive them on the grounds simply of mathematical consistency. Because we can already think of mathematically consistent laws that don’t describe the world as we know it. And we will always be left with a question ‘why are the laws nature what they are rather than some other laws?’. And I don’t see any way out of that.”
In fact, there are “an infinite number of true mathematical theorems exist that cannot be proved from any finite system of axioms.”
To repeat what Weinberg said, “we can already think of mathematically consistent laws that don’t describe the world as we know it. And we will always be left with a question ‘why are the laws nature what they are rather than some other laws? . And I don’t see any way out of that.”’
The Christian has a ready answer to this dilemma of an infinite number of “mathematically consistent laws” that could have described the universe but didn’t,,,, “the transcendent reality on which our universe depends must be something that can exhibit agency – a mind that can choose among the infinite variety of mathematical descriptions and bring into existence a reality that corresponds to a consistent subset of them. This is what “breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe.” Anything else invokes random miracles as an explanatory principle and spells the end of scientific rationality.”
But hey, you don’t have to take Dr. Gordon’s word for it. Both Einstein and Wigner are on record as to regarding the applicability of mathematics to the universe as a ‘miracle’. Shoot, Einstein even went so far as to chastise ‘professional atheists’ in the process of calling it a miracle.
Moreover, as I pointed out the other day, “The belief that mathematics has a necessary existence, and that it is not contingent upon the Mind of God for its existence, prevented the rise of modern science and is what is currently behind the stagnation in theoretical physics with String Theory.”
https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/honest-question-at-space-com-is-string-theory-worth-it/#comment-701274
Bob O’H,
Again, you have just not only not refuted Egnor, you have restated him!
Shorter Carroll: “PHYSICS is all there is, coz materialism.”
Shorter Egnor: “LOGIC is not the same as PHYSICS. PHYSICS however requires LOGIC. Since LOGIC exists, Carroll is wrong.”
Shorter Bob O’H: “Egnor’s wrong – PHYSICS requires LOGIC!”
Continuing my analogy of post 8 above, you can only claim I “utterly fail” at point 3 if you insist that, because elements of the periodic table (logic) are used in man-made vehicles (physics), elements are vehicles and vehicles are elements. Nope. At this point you appear to be being obtuse simply to avoid addressing the actual argument.
But he also contradicts himself by saying ” Logic shares no commonality with physics. That is, the Venn diagram of logic and the Venn diagram of physics don’t overlap in any way. Mathematical logic is entirely separate from mathematical physics”. If physics requires logic, it can’t be entirely separate from it. This really shouldn’t be difficult to understand.
Bob: “If physics requires logic, it can’t be entirely separate from it.”
True as far as it goes, but then again, if physics requires logic, but logic can’t be derived from physics, (which was Egnor’s main point), then naturalism and/or materialism must be false,
As Egnor stated, “If Carroll is right that man is governed entirely by the laws of physics, without remainder, then where do the laws of logic come from?”
To quote Bob: “This really shouldn’t be difficult to understand.”
I don’t think that makes sense. Isn’t enough that logic can be derived from a physical system?
Bob states: “I don’t think that makes sense. Isn’t (it) enough that logic can be derived from a physical system?”
But that is Dr. Egnor’s entire point. Logic CAN”T be derived from a physical system.
If it were possible to ‘derive logic’ from a physical system, that is to say, if it were possible for logic to be ’emergent’ from a physical, i.e. material, substrate, (such as Darwinists falsely claim that information and consciousness are themselves supposedly ’emergent’ from a physical, i.e. material, substrate), then it directly follows that logic should have some physical, i.e. material, parameter that we can measure.
Yet this plainly is not the case, to repeat:
To go a bit further in Dr. Egnor’s line of reasoning, if I may,,
Since the abstract concept of species itself is forever beyond any possible reductive materialistic explanation, then so much for Darwinists ever giving us an adequate explanation for the ‘Origin of Species’.
But hey, don’t take my word for it, Darwinists themselves admit as much,
In fact, Charles Darwin himself admitted that he did not have a rigid ‘physical’ definition for what the term ‘species’ actually meant when he stated that, “I look at the term species as one arbitrarily given, for the sake of convenience.,,,”
In short, and in conclusion, to deny the independent reality, indeed, to deny the primacy of the ‘abstract’ immaterial realm of mind over the material realm , is simply insane.
As Sedgwick told Darwin himself, “Here, in language, & still more in logic, we are point blank at issue— There is a moral or metaphysical part of nature as well as a physical. A man who denies this is deep in the mire of folly,,”
ba77 –
But isn’t that irrelevant if it can by derived by a physical system?
Bob O’H,
I’ll meet you halfway. I will agree that YOUR interpretation of what Egnor means when he says logic is entirely separate from physics would mean his argument is “absurd”. If you in turn agree that your interpretation cannot be correct since Egnor spends the next paragraph and a half defining exactly what he means when he says logic is entirely separate from physics, and it isn’t your interpretation!
It is a truth indisputable that a Venn diagram of mathematical logic statements and mathematical physics statements do not overlap, in the same way that it is a truth indisputable that a Venn diagram of elements in the periodic table and man-made vehicles do not overlap.
I can already hear Bob O’H arguing over whether apples are oranges:
Egnor: “Apples are entirely separate from oranges. A Venn diagram of apples and oranges do not overlap in any way.”
Bob O’H: “A-ha! But apples and oranges are both fruits, so they AREN’T entirely separate, are they? Egnor’s claim is absurd!”
Congratulations, world – Bob O’H has discovered that Venn diagrams are entirely useless, because you can always find a relationship between any two categories! (A and not-A both use the term A, right? So there is overlap!!!)
P.S. And I believe it would be you, Bob, whom Egnor is speaking of when he says “A materialist might argue (vaguely) that the laws of logic are just epiphenomenal vapor from our physical brains”, with your comment that ” isn’t that irrelevant if it can by derived by a physical system?”
So Bob you claim, without any examples, that logic can be derived from a physical system, Dr. Egnor claims it can’t. and gave his reasons for exactly why logic can never be derived from a physical system, namely, logic is profoundly immaterial in its foundational nature.
Since logic is clearly immaterial in its foundational nature, and yet you make the contrary. indeed completely counterintuitive, claim that it can by derived by (or from) a physical system, then clearly it is on you to prove that such a counterintuitive proposition is feasible. (For instance, perform an experiment and show me exactly how much does the law of non-contradiction weigh or how fast it may go, or etc.. etc…)
Good luck with that futile, and deluded, endeavor.
In your fevered Darwinian imagination you may think such a materialistic explanation for the laws of logic is possible, but science could care less what you falsely imagine to be possible and is only interested in what you can actually prove to be feasible.
Of note: