If the B theory of time is true, then does causation exist?
Suppose that the metaphysics behind the b theory of time is true, and all events exist tenselessly, then what does that mean for causation?
What does that mean for the debate over determinism, compatibilism, libertarian free will, and indeterminacy?
If you want to make specific arguments over how 4 dimensionalism or eternalism or moving spotlight theory affect the notions of causation or free will or whatever, I welcome the conversation!
What does that mean for the debate over determinism, compatibilism, libertarian free will, and indeterminacy?
If you want to make specific arguments over how 4 dimensionalism or eternalism or moving spotlight theory affect the notions of causation or free will or whatever, I welcome the conversation!
Comments (8)
Causality wouldn't exist, which is what the laws of physics say anyway..
Quoting Walter Pound
Determinism would be absolute, free will wouldn't exist, but compatibilism would remain nonsense.
Quoting Walter Pound
Relativity is not our only fundamental theory. For the Block to be compatible with quantum mechanics, we need a bigger determinism to cope with entanglement effects. or we need a bigger universe.
Two solutions are Superdeterminism, or the Multiverse. Under Superdeterminism, reality is a conspiracy, scientific knowledge is fake, causality doesn't exist, and free will is absolutely excluded. Under the quantum multiverse, reality is our playground, we may create knowledge, causality is recovered, and free will exists.
People hate the quantum multiverse for some reason, perhaps they are superdetermined to.
What's the difference between Superdeterminism and plain old determinism?
Causation would still be a valid way to determine the relation of events.
Quoting Walter Pound
I don't think the nature of time impacts the debate much. Events are connected regardless of whether you think they all exist tenselessly or continuously "happen". The real question isn't whether the physical world is deterministic, because it has to be for us to know anything about it. The question is whether the self is also physical.
Can you explain what you mean?
Quoting Echarmion
How does that affect the possibility of either determinism, indeterminacy, libertarian free will and compatiblism if all events exist tenselessly?
Well for a being moving through time in one direction, the connections between events would appear as cause and effect.
Or perhaps more accurately: For a being that perceived time as a one-dimensional flow, events would look like that. It might also be the other way around and the fact that one perceives events as causes and effects would lead one to perceive time as flowing. And this would be valid, in the sense that it accurately represents the connections between events.
Quoting Walter Pound
Well if the mind is not physical, then the perception of free will exists outside the physical universe. As such, it could then be "true" irrespective of the nature of the physical world.
Think of it this way: the world you see is a picture in your mind, a thought. Why would this thought, with it's notions of causality and determinism, be more important than the thoughts which include decisions and thus free will?
The issue is if one can say that x caused y in eternalism and it seems like one must argue that x and y eternally coexist, but are not the cause of each other. Supposed one looked at two locations of space, that eternally exist, it wouldn't make much sense to say that one location caused the other.
Quoting Echarmion
If the metaphysics behind the b theory of time is correct, then any thought that exists eternally and never came into being or goes out of being. This is why it is so hard to see how one could argue that free will exists. I don't even think one can use the word determinism to describe such a state of affairs.
Not if you saw them as points in a multidimensional space you can travel in several directions. But if you imagine being on a train that travels a single track, ever forward, would it not make sense that one sign on the track, or different colors of the track, cause each other? Presumably, to other travelers on that train, this statement would make sense.
Quoting Walter Pound
How is that different from a world where all thoughts that will ever be are already determined at the beginning of creation?
I do think I made a mistake in my previous argument. Depending on what you mean by the "metaphysic behind the theory are true". If that means that the block universe is the actual, objective reality that causes our being and our experience, then I suppose that would make determinism objectively real too. We will never know though.
Well, under eternalism, those thoughts were not determined by anything. They simply exist eternally.
When one sets up a series of dominoes and tips over the first domino, we expect the last domino to fall over since, in our ordinary experience at least, there seem to a cause for every event that occurs to our knowledge. However, if eternalism is true, then whatever exists is itself eternal and never came, or goes, out of existence. In that case, the notion of cause and effect must carry a different meaning than the ordinary one we use or the notion of cause and effect must be doubted.