Does choice imply more than one actual possibility?

[His clay]

I'm currently about to start reading post 23. There are some posts that I'm skipping, but I'm trying to read the vast majority. Ugh, I just noticed that this thread is now at 141 after I post this. I'll try to wade through a lot before responding.

 

[Josheb]

Without contention, I'm asking, How does this tangent relate to the OP? I'm genuinely curious. I wondered when you asked @John Bauer if he found problems in Feynman's video.

We went here earlier as a way to deal theoretically/abstract with what is and what is not possible. Is this an attempt to discredit that earlier reference? I.e is this perhaps trying to point out that Feynman's view may well be irrelevant?

If the Feynman video is relevant to this op (as evidenced by others considering it) then its places of veracity and lack thereof are not tangential. @John Bauer is commendably analytical and I thought it would serve to change historical dynamics if he were to initiate an analysis rather than I be the one performing a forensic analysis. Part of the problem inherent when discussing this particular Christian doctrine is the matter of time because God, according to scripture, pre-exists time and, therefore, exists outside of time. In general, everyone agrees 1) time is simply a measure of cause-and-effect (or what Feynman calls "change"), and 2) time is relative. Christians generally agree time is different for God because He exists outside of that which He created (which would include time and space).

How does this tangent relate to the OP?

It's not a tangent. It is simply a focus on one relevant aspect of God's design of creation (divine cosmology) in Christianity.

I'm genuinely curious.

This is not the first time what I just said about time and its relevance to God's design of creation has been discussed by us.

 

[makesends]

The route you chose was created for you. You did not create the route or spontaneously decide to take that route. While it is "theoretically" possible for you to spontaneously decide to Dan'l Boone it cross country the fact remains, the route is established by Providence no matter which route you choose

Obviously. I don't think anyone here disputes that. What I don't get is why you mention it.

The choice is always one. If I want to go to the kitchen it is theoretically possible to climb out the window, walk around the house and go in the back door but that is theoretical which is what most of what we call choice really is. Simply alternative theoretical possibilities. Most actual choices are responses to the pressure of internal and external circumstance, also known as providence and that is the will of God.

I agree.

So being constrained by circumstances and leaving out theoretical choice, most of our choices are as self determined as a feather in a wind storm and God is the director. God created the circumstances and provides the path for the feather to float along.

Well, yes and no. What we choose is as sure to happen as a feather in a windstorm, and was so (according to my logic, anyway) from the foundation of the world. But we chose it, nonetheless, by our own will.

I appreciate the opportunity to clarify half formed thoughts into coherent sentences. Not frustrating, at all

 

[QVQ]

Obviously. I don't think anyone here disputes that. What I don't get is why you mention it

The basic theological format for the Op and subsequent POV's is Aquinas
Why I mention it is because it is motion:
The First Way: Motion
1. All bodies are either potentially in motion or actually in motion.
2. "But nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality"
3. Nothing can be at once in both actuality and potentiality in the same respect.
4. Therefore nothing can be at once in both actuality and potentiality with respect to motion
5. Therefore nothing can move itself; it must be put into motion by something else.
6. If there were no "first mover, moved by no other" there would be no motion.
7. But there is motion.
8. Therefore there is a first mover, God.

I tend to define the word "contingent" as "cause." Aquinas defined the word "contingent" as to be or not to be, which is contingent, possible.

An infinite series of movers is impossible. Yet mention possibility and the theoretical list of possib les for any given circumstance is infinite.
So maybe it is better to use contigent for possible, whether a thing can be or not within the limit of circumstance.

Theoretically I can cook anything for dinner, however whether it is actually "possible' that I am going to kill and skin a lizard, is not a contingency to be therefore not to be.
So there it is, two choices according to Some Here
But only one choice as God creates the actualities and decides on the contingencies. God chose, one act and done.

 

[His clay]

@makesends
So I've read a good chunk of the material, but I have not read all of it. Quite a bit of the discussion rubs me the wrong way because of a whole host of fallacies. I'm leaving the particulars and participants undefined at the moment. I'll take a pause for today, and maybe I'll continue reading tomorrow. That is my progress for now. From my assessment today, I'm unsure whether joining the dialogue is really worth the headache. But tomorrow is a new day, and I may be more patient and kind tomorrow.

 

[John Bauer]

Understandable. That's too bad because I'll bet we'd share common concerns about Feynman's view of time.

We are both Christians, we are both Reformed, and we are both presuppositionalists. I am sure that we share a lot of the same concerns in common when it comes to Feynman’s ideas about creation and time. As for the problems inherent in his view? They are many, some of which you touched upon. One you didn’t mention that I find a bit amusing is how he treats “scientific” as self-authenticating while the very conditions that make science possible—logic, induction, normativity, semantics—are treated as expendable “coffee arguments.”

There was also the telltale oscillation so common in non-Christian views, between a Parmenidean freeze (“all equally real”) and a Heraclitean flux (“you are the process”). Non-Christian metaphysics habitually ricochets between the One and the Many, the static and the changing, never reconciling them because it suppresses the triune God in whom unity and diversity, permanence and change, are equally ultimate without metaphysical trade-off.

We could if we both endeavored to change. Ironic given the topic.

It only takes one to start.

Without looking it up, do you know what dimensions 5 through 10 are in String Theory? (or the 11 in M-Theory, if you prefer)?

I vaguely recall Hugh Ross saying in Beyond the Cosmos (1999) that they are six hypothetical spatial dimensions tightly curled up everywhere—and I mean tight like Planck scale—located throughout our four-dimensional manifold. They are mathematical constructs, additional spatial degrees of freedom required by the maths, not empirically distinguished axes like length, width, height, or time.

Lee Smolin, my favorite theoretical physicist, would say that these extra spatial dimensions in string theory are not known to be anything at all—asking someone what they “are” is already conceding too much. They are not observed. They are not measured. String theory doesn’t even uniquely specify what those dimensions “are” in a physical, descriptive sense. They are assumptions imposed to preserve internal mathematical consistency within a particular research program.

 

[makesends]

I vaguely recall Hugh Ross saying in Beyond the Cosmos (1999) that they are six hypothetical spatial dimensions tightly curled up everywhere—and I mean tight like Planck scale—located throughout our four-dimensional manifold. They are mathematical constructs, additional spatial degrees of freedom required by the maths, not empirically distinguished axes like length, width, height, or time.

Lee Smolin, my favorite theoretical physicist, would say that these extra spatial dimensions in string theory are not known to be anything at all—asking someone what they “are” is already conceding too much. They are not observed. They are not measured. String theory doesn’t even uniquely specify what those dimensions “are” in a physical, descriptive sense. They are assumptions imposed to preserve internal mathematical consistency within a particular research program.

I keep hearing things like this, that such theories are only theoretical frameworks from which to continue to reason, a little analogous to math treating whole processes as variables. I wonder if Michio Kaku would agree that string theory was actually just a very useful way to look at the universe, and not a description of the universe. He certainly was enthusiastic about it.

 

[John Bauer]

I keep hearing things like this, that such theories are only theoretical frameworks from which to continue to reason, a little analogous to math treating whole processes as variables. I wonder if Michio Kaku would agree that string theory was actually just a very useful way to look at the universe, and not a description of the universe. He certainly was enthusiastic about it.

Michio Kaku does not have much credibility, in my opinion. He may be a legitimate theoretical physicist by training, but he functions primarily as a science popularizer and media personality. His frequent appearances on speculative TV programs—multiverses, time travel, alien intelligence, consciousness-as-physics, etc.—reflect a shift toward high-level conjecture presented with unwarranted confidence. In my books, he is only slightly more credible than Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye. He is about on par with Stanton T. Friedman.

 

[makesends]

Michio Kaku does not have much credibility, in my opinion. He may be a legitimate theoretical physicist by training, but he functions primarily as a science popularizer and media personality. His frequent appearances on speculative TV programs—multiverses, time travel, alien intelligence, consciousness-as-physics, etc.—reflect a shift toward high-level conjecture presented with unwarranted confidence. In my books, he is only slightly more credible than Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye. He is about on par with Stanton T. Friedman.

Bill Nye???!!! Wow, you know how to hurt a guy!