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Topic: Indeterminism

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	Free will - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Determinism holds that each state of affairs is necessitated (determined) by the states of affairs that preceded it, an extension of cause and effect.
		Indeterminism holds this proposition to be incorrect, and that there are events which are not entirely determined by previous states of affairs.
		But he did believe that indeterminism is important as a "doctrine of relief" -- it allows for the view that, although the world may be in many respects a bad place, it may through our actions become a better one.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Free_will_and_determinism (4333 words)

	Indeterminism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Indeterminism is the philosophical belief that free will and determinism are incompatible, and that there are events which do not correspond with determinism.
		One version holds that some events are uncaused, another holds that there are nondeterministically caused events, and the third holds that there are agent-caused events.
		Indeterminism is also the name of an industrial rock band from Cleveland, Ohio.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Indeterminism (87 words)

	Incompatibilist (Nondeterministic) Theories of Free Will
		The required indeterminism nevertheless suffices, he holds, to provide the agent with "ultimate control" over her decision, which an agent has only if at no time prior to the decision is there any minimally causally sufficient condition for the agent's making that decision that includes no event or state internal to the agent.
		The indeterminism in this case (in comparison with a case in which his throwing the dart causally determines its hitting the target) diminishes the chance of his succeeding at bringing about a nonactive result that he is actively trying to bring about.
		But the indeterminism in Elena's case is located differently; it is located in the causal connection between certain nonactive events—Elena's recognizing and assessing certain reasons—and her performance of a basic action—her making a decision.
	plato.stanford.edu /entries/incompatibilism-theories (9758 words)

	Peter Ericson \| Indeterminism and the Bohm Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
		Determinism and indeterminism are limited and only valid and meaningful in certain abstractions from the qualitatively and quantitatively unlimited totality.
		In Bohm's worldview it cannot be said that either determinism or indeterminism is the ultimate principle; both are abstractions of the totality and both have limited domains of applicability, neither being primary.
		Though determinism may dominate on the quantum level, indeterminism may be at work on a deeper level; and even so, ultimately neither determinism nor indeterminism has meaning or validity in the qualitatively and quantitatively infinite totality, the undivided wholeness.
	www.pericson.com /writings/bohmindeterminism (2377 words)

	ATL: Indeterminism vs. free will (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		Indeterminism means that one's voluntary actions are random and acausal, whereas free will holds that they are ~caused~ by one's free choices.
		According to indeterminism, in certain cases it is just a sheer, causeless accident which of two actions a man performs.
		Although they seem to be opposites, determinism and indeterminism are fundamentally similar in that both theories deny the possibility of choice and of self-control.
	www.wetheliving.com /pipermail/atlantis/Week-of-Mon-20021216/002133.html (229 words)

	CorredoiraI3
		Basically, they argue that free will is possible because there is an ontological indeterminism in the natural laws, and that the mind is responsible for the wave function collapse of matter, which leads to a choice among the different possibilities for the body.
		This indeterminism is present in all microscopic systems where quantum effects are important and is diluted in large collections of particles (the macroscopic state) to converge towards Newtonian mechanics, unless there exists a mechanism in which the state of a macroscopic system depends on that of a very few "microscopic" particles.
		Indeterminism is not an absence of causation but the presence of non-deterministic causal processes (Fetzer 1988).
	www.emergentmind.org /corredoiraI3.htm (4333 words)

	[No title] (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		He posits that indeterminism might enter the process leading to an action at the stage of deliberation, through indeterministic processes affecting those things that become considerations in the deliberative process.
		However, he argues that the agent still has “ultimate control” over these actions, because the indeterminism that can arise in deliberation ensures that no set of sufficient causes exists that is external to the agent and her deliberative processes.
		She offers an alternative account that locates the indeterminism in the function of the individual’s evaluative faculty in the development of a preference.
	gfp.typepad.com /ilibertarian_accounts_of_/files/chapter_4.doc (1029 words)

	Determinism, Indeterminism, and Libertarianism
		Thus the "extent of indetermination" of an event with respect to a given characteristic depends in general upon two factors, viz.
		It means that e had a finite range of indetermination for at least one dimension of at least one of the characteristics of which it was a manifestation.
		Indeterminism is the doctrine that some, and it may be all, events are not completely determined, in the sense defined.
	www.ditext.com /broad/dil.html (7365 words)

	The Open Universe: An Argument for Indeterminism (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		Indeterminism will be all the more true in the social sciences (historicism).
		Indeterminism is a cardinal characteristic of matter: all singular events in this world are unique, free.
		Indeterminism means that somewhre, there must be causes that are themselves uncaused, or, random).
	www.construction-directory.org /construction-books/isbn0415078652.html (1491 words)

	dfwKaneTabled
		One must think of the effort and the indeterminism as fused; the effort is indeterminate and the indeterminism is a property of the effort, not something separate that occurs after or before the effort.
		And the indeterminism that is diminishing her control over the other thing she is trying to do (act selfishly and go to her meeting) is coming from her desire and effort to do the opposite (to be a moral person and act on moral reasons).
		So, in each case, the indeterminism is functioning as a hindrance or obstacle to her realizing one of her purposes--a hindrance or obstacle in the form of resistance within her will which has to be overcome by effort.
	www.ucl.ac.uk /~uctytho/dfwVariousKane.html (6876 words)

	Philosophy 151
		One obvious approach would be to simply deny determinism in favor of indeterminism, generally taken to be the view that at least some events are not causally necessitated by preceding events.
		However, this view of indeterminism, in which the events corresponding to human choices and actions are uncaused, or random, fares no better with respect to our usual notions of free will and moral responsibility than determinism.
		We recall that determinism is the theory that all events, including human actions, have a their necessary cause in prior events and circumstances; and that indeterminism is the theory that at least some events are uncaused.
	home.earthlink.net /~delia5/pagan/tcq/phil-meta-pap2.htm (2350 words)

	Essay: Indeterminism . . . Settled (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		The issue of Indeterminism has consumed enough intellectual capital; as has, the question of whether the physical or the metaphysical is real; as to one, each, or neither.
		Again, in general: Indeterminism maximizes as evolutionary complexity maximizes; each in the manner of a standard distribution curve.
		It is not necessary to consider the self-serving, illogical miracles of anthropic creeds to determine the existence and effects of the nonquantitative, or nonlocal, nature of metaphysics.
	www.brunardot.com /e-ins.htm (393 words)

	Harvard Square Library :: Charles Hartshorne :: Indeterminism (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		Indeterminism can, thus, account for nature’s regularities, whereas determinism cannot account for its novelty.
		This point is often missed, because indeterminism is mistakenly identified with the view that events are never causally conditioned.
		It is not simply a limitation of knowledge that prevents one from predicting a poet’s next poem: such a prediction would amount to composing the poem oneself.
	www.harvardsquarelibrary.org /Hartshorne/Viney/10.html (252 words)

	PhilSci Archive - Indeterminism in Neurobiology
		I examine different arguments that could be used to establish indeterminism of neurological processes.
		Even though scenarios where single events at the molecular level make the difference in the outcome of such processes are realistic, this falls short of establishing indeterminism, because it is not clear that these molecular events are subject to quantum mechanical uncertainty.
		Furthermore, attempts to argue for indeterminism autonomously (i.e., independently of quantum mechanics) fail, because both deterministic and indeterministic models can account for the empirically observed behavior of ion channels.
	philsci-archive.pitt.edu /archive/00002153 (141 words)

	[No title]
		Indeterminism -- or more precisely, physical indeterminism -- is merely the doctrine that not all events in the physical world are predetermined with absolute precision, in all their infinitesimal details.
		The concept of indeterminism was born out of and borne by the forces of theism which were concerned with defending their gods against the charge of creating and permitting evil.
		That there may have been a relatively miniscule number of events without antecedent causes in a universe where experience supported by scientific knowledge tells us that the predominance of events does have antecedent causes is of small consequence in determining whether the universe is deterministic.
	www2.sunysuffolk.edu /schievp/file22e.html (2768 words)

	New Page 1 (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		If the physical world is causally determined, then the initial state of the world (perhaps the big bang) plus all the laws of nature are sufficient to determine every subsequent state of the world (given that the world was the way that it was and the laws of nature are fixed).
		Indeterminism is the view that some events are not completely determined by preceding events and the laws of nature.
		Notice that we can’t reject the first premise, because it is of the form P or not-P. Either Determinism is true or it isn’t (Indeterminism is the position that determinism is false).
	wsuonline.weber.edu /course.philo.1010/Lecture14.htm (3262 words)

	The Metaphysical Freedom
		It is therefore clear that even in the realm of indeterminism, where enthusiasts of quantum mechanics thought they were glimpsing at the solution,(10) free will has no room, and we find ourselves in a similar nightmare as the one of physical determinism.
		We now suppose that the decision is once again indeterminate and, additionally, that the decision is his in every sense or, in other words, that it is autonomously generated by his will.
		Aleatory indeterminism entails a nightmare as ghastly as that of the 'physic determinist' because both of them leave the human being in a situation of total indolence.
	www.infidels.org /library/modern/features/2000/lujan1.html (2238 words)

	freedom1
		Indeterminism: Certain decisions and acts (namely, "free" ones) have nothing that causes them to occur; they are pure chance events; they simply happen, having nothing to do with the person doing the act.
		Indeterminism as a philosophical theory: The scientific assumption that all events in nature are determined is unwarranted; indeed, chance events are perhaps even necessary to account for the diversity of things in the universe.
		Indeterminism reduces the whole scientific effort to explain nature and human beings to mere probability, and it makes such an effort a waste of time insofar as it does not guarantee that understanding human behavior will allow us to improve it.
	www-phil.tamu.edu /~sdaniel/Notes/freedom1.html (1273 words)

	Undetached Rabbit Parts: December 2004
		Indeterminism is the view that there are some choices where no sufficient causal conditions exist outside free agents that determine the wills or actions of free agents.
		Both positions have accrued problems that can be called "classic criticisms." I would like to pose just one of these for each position in the form of a dilemma.
		While I will not pretend to offer a solution that is acceptable to everyone, I believe it is possible to arbitrate among these positions in favor of indeterminism.
	wmuphilosophy.blogspot.com /2004_12_01_wmuphilosophy_archive.html (486 words)

	INTRODUCTION TO FREE AGENCY (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		Indeterminism = the theory that some events are not determined, including, perhaps, some human actions.
		If indeterminism is true, then all undetermined human actions are random, so that we could not do other than what we do, i.e., we're never responsible for what we do.
		Hard Indeterminism = Compatibilism + the claim that indeterminism is true (and determinism is necessary for freedom).
	www.csun.edu /~ds56723/phil403/hout403freedomintro.htm (303 words)

	Consciousness, Causality, Quantum Physics
		The standard interpretation of quantum physics assumes that the quantum world is characterized by absolute indeterminism and that quantum systems exist objectively only when they are being measured or observed.
		Quantum indeterminism is clearly open to interpretation: it either means hidden (to us) causes, or a complete absence of causes.
		But if this indeterminism is interpreted to mean absolute chance, it would mean that our choices and actions just "pop up" in a totally random and arbitrary way, in which case they could hardly be said to be our choices and the expression of our own free will.
	ourworld.compuserve.com /homepages/dp5/jse.htm (3609 words)

	Subjective Bayesianism and Indeterminism (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		Giere claims that both limiting frequency and single-case propensity interpretations of probability are consistent with physical indeterminism, while subjective Bayesianism is not (section 4).
		For my understanding, Bayesianism regards probability as subjective degrees of belief which is determined by the agent's information and background knowledge, and would be changed (according to some conditionalization rule) when new evidence is acquired or the whole knowledge system is altered.
		If (probably in some contexts) indeterminism has become more credible, the agent should involve it in his background knowledge and alter her beliefs in relevant propositions.
	philosophy.wisc.edu /960/_disc1/00000006.htm (154 words)

	Introduction (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		The second issue is with proving that any determinism or indeterminism apparent in these abstractions is "not an artifact of the way the phenomenon is being idealized or mathematized, rather than inherent to the phenomenon itself".
		Again, the truth of indeterminism would not seem to change the similarity between the physical matter we observe and that of which we are constructed.
		It is preferable to continue scientific study of the subject in the hope that future findings will either show the expectations of libertarians to be inconsistent with the physical world, or to illuminate some yet unknown physical mechanism that confirms the belief that we enjoy agency in the libertarian sense of the term.
	www.u.arizona.edu /~lehrer/free_will/Irwin_Hobbs.html (4083 words)

	[No title]
		I think that the defenders of this line have overlooked that an autonomous biological indeterminism can only be had at the cost of giving up the supervenience of biological properties on physical properties.
		Thus, what he and others have defended is not indeterminism about neurological processes but a very peculiar account of the role of the central nervous system in human behavior.
		But this would be necessary for quantum indeterminism to have the kind of metaphysical implications that it is generally thought to have.
	philsci-archive.pitt.edu /archive/00002072/01/Indeterminism5.doc (4767 words)

	Determinism vs Indeterminism - TheologyWeb Campus
		We have indeterminism for all intents and purposes.
		Indeterminism as a scientific position, or as a philosophical position about observational activities, is something I’ve never fully grasped.
		On the one hand, the term (indeterminism) seems to be a wholly epistemological, only dealing with our knowledge of how particles on the quantum level behave.
	www.theologyweb.com /forum/showthread.php?t=20239 (1665 words)

	Explaining and Alleviating Information Management Indeterminism: A Knowledge-Based Framework
		There is indeterminism in the assignments of subject descriptors to documents and indeterminism in the selection of search terms by an inquirer.
		She argued that: 1) subject indexing is indeterminate and probabilistic (the uncertainty principle); 2) variety of searcher query must equal variety of document indexing (the variety principle); and 3) the search process is subtle and complex (the complexity principle).
		Subject area indeterminism is rated by determining the completeness and accuracy of the (uncontrolled) keywords assigned to a text and the quality of abstracted/translated text.
	ai.bpa.arizona.edu /papers/ipm91/ipm91.html (10735 words)

	Ephilosopher :: Metaphysics and Epistemology :: Hume's Compatibilism is False (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-08)
		The argument:: From the premise: indeterminism is incompatible, with free will, therefore, determinism which is the contradictory of indeterminism is compatible with free will must be compatible with free will is a non-sequitur.
		It might be, as a matter of fact, the both indeterminism and determinism were incompatible with free will, and it that were true, it would follow that there was no free will.
		But this consideration which is used to show that indeterminism is incompatible with not so much freedom of the will, as with irresponsibility, is, as it were icing on the cake.
	www.ephilosopher.com /phpBB_14-action-viewtopic-topic-3757.html (3885 words)

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