See the summary of today's broadcast below, but first, added in 2020, some thoughts on one issue briefly addressed...
* Coincidence or Determinism? Hear about a few of the many interesting coincidences Bob’s ministry has experienced over the years and get a preview of Friday’s Real Science Radio program, and learn about how Newtonian Physics and modern theology stand to gain profitable insights from the world of quantum mechanics!
To disprove biblically the settled future, see the 500+ verses listed in 33 categories at opentheism.org/verses. Once a believer admits the obvious, that God can think new thoughts and write new songs, he realizes the overtly clear context of the entire Bible that the future is not settled but open. Therefore, of course, anyone is wrong who claims that the future is determined (whether exhaustively predestined, exhaustively foreknown, or both). And if determinism is wrong, then of course compatibilism is wrong, which is the belief that free will and determinism coexist as mutally compatible and logically consistent. Thus a short proof falsying compatibilism is:
Premise: Determinism is false.
Conclusion: Compatibilism is false.
Indeterminism, Determinism, QM, & Philosophers: Regarding whether determinism is the leading view of philosophers, we'll look at a survey, below, of 3,000 philosophers. But first a few observations.
- A subreddit philosophy moderator wrote that because of the impact of quantum mechanics, "I would guess that most philosophers think that the best current interpretation of fundamental physics is indeterministic..."
- Physicist Leonard Susskind notes that quantum mechanics shatters conventional notions of determinism. (Unrelated: Susskind appears 3 minutes into RSR's video on Fine Tuning.) Decades before Susskind made this observation, Nobel-prize winner Richard Feynman made the same point from 46:50 to 51:05 of this lecture:
- That fits with the Comparison chart in a Wikipedia quantum mechanics article. As of February 2021, this chart shows that of the 13 most popular QM interpretations, two are non-commital, four are deterministic including Many Worlds/Multiverse, and seven are consistent with indeterminism including the Copenhagen, objective collapse, Qbism, and four other interpretations.
- Yet that same reddit philosophy moderator above reports that regarding free will, "most philosophers are determinists".
- Another says, "most philosophers who believe in free will also believe in determinism".
- These estimations were made a few years ago. So with the budding success of quantum computers beginning now in the third decade of the 21st century, many QM sceptics will be won over, including the reticient philosophers.
- By the way, Cambridge's McTaggart (tantrum throwing B theorist) denied we have genuine choice as everything is the effect of causes.
- 3,000 philosophers, philosophy graduate students, etc. surveyed here in 2013...
- Regarding God, 73% claimed to be atheists, 15% were theists, and 12% other.
- Regarding Free Will, 59% were compatibilists, 14% believed in libertarianism/free will, and 12% claimed there was no such thing as free will; 15% had other answers. This survey question is described in the philosophy section of Open Culture like this:
Compatibilism... we can choose our actions... and to some degree they are determined by prior events. Libertarianism... claims that all of our actions are freely chosen.
- A philosopher from Georgia University wrote:
I would estimate that close to 2/3 of professional philosophers are compatibilists... with the other 1/3 roughly split between libertarians (incompatibilists who believe in free will and indeterminism) and hard incompatibilism or skeptics about free will (incompatibilist determinists who deny free will).
RSR Prediction re: Quantum Computing's Effect on Philosophers: Many philosophers are materialists and therefore believe that human beings are only material. (To correct all that confusion, see RSR's List of Things, Real Things, that are Not Physical.) Quantum computing will increasingly perform beyond the ability of classical computing. Therefore RSR predicts that by 2035 there will be a measureable move toward physical indeterminism within the philosophical community. And because of the (invalid) materialist worldview of so many philosophers, this will lead to a more widespread support for indeterminism even regarding the human will. See this at rsr.org/predictions#indeterminism.
Today's BEL broadcast summary...
* Calling All Popes: …or at least this Pope, to resign, turn himself in and have the decency to disband the increasingly corrupt Catholic Church.
* Criminals & Aliens: Bob and co-host Doug McBurney reveal that it was a criminal and not (non-existent) aliens that shut down the New Mexico Solar Observatory, (despite the desire of increasing numbers of the masses to want it to be aliens).
* The Kavanaugh/Blasey Probability: Find out why whether what she said, or he said is true, the fact remains that the behavior she describes is as predictable as vomiting on your roommate's furniture in the teenage culture fostered by Hollywood, Washington, and the public schools.
BEL & RSR's Quantum Thoughts:
- 2018: Quantum Biology Pt. 1: Doing what standard chemistry and physics can't
- 2019: QB Pt. 2: Our seemingly impossible sense of smell
- 2019: How Quantum Computers Do It: Finally, a Helpful Explanation
- 2019: Google's Quantum Supremacy
- 2019: Top Mathematicians: Ants & Bees, Mold & Amoebas (this program)
- 2018: Coincidence or Determinism? Quantum theology and physics
- 2015: An RSR preview show
- 2020: Bob's draft paper rsr.org/wave-particle-duality-is-a-triality.