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Duigan MacBoyd
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Date Joined May 2007
Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/4/2008 3:45 PM (GMT -6) |   |
3. God knows all that might and might not happen.
a) To know what ‘might and might not’ occur has plenty of information content.
b) To not be certain about how the future will actually play out is no failure of knowledge. But I’ve already commented on that.
Duigan: The actualized events have information content.
Tom: Right. Actuality is the only repository of information. Truth supervenes on being.
Duigan: The unactualized events don't, because there has been no reduction in uncertainty.
Tom: The fact that unactualized events themselves don’t have information content has nothing to do with certainty/uncertainty. It has to do with their being non-actual.
Information theory says that information is gained when there is a reduction in uncertainty, an elimination of possibilities, the actualization of one possibility to the exclusion of others.
That's what I meant by unactualized events.
As Schneider says:
"Information is always a measure of the decrease of uncertainty at a receiver (or molecular machine)."
This I agree with:
b) To not be certain about how the future will actually play out is no failure of knowledge.
Not this:
a) To know what ‘might and might not’ occur has plenty of information content.
I'm only examining the future contingents, the unactualized choices and events, not the 'infrastructure', the 'givens'.
People will exist. They will make choices. Some will put on green shirts. Some will not wear green.
We know what coins are, how many sides, the probabilities of fair and unfair tosses.
That's the "will, will not" information. I'm only interested in the measurement of the "might and might not" information. And it's content is 0 until an event occurs, a choice is made.
Post Edited (Duigan MacBoyd) : 3/4/2008 2:55:22 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 3/4/2008 4:44 PM (GMT -6) | | Hello Duigan,
Your challenge to the informativeness of 'might and might not' propositions based on information theory is very interesting and not one I've heard before. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
I think the challenge can be easily met. (Note: I haven't had the time to read your entire discussion with Tom, so I apologize if I'm treading on old ground.)
Informativeness has to do with excluding possibilities. That seems right. It follows that 'WILL' and 'WILL NOT' propositions are maximally informative because (on the Peircean interpretation) they exclude all but one possibility. Thus,
WILL implies a probability of 1, which excludes everything in the half-open interval [0,1).
WILL NOT implies a probability of 0, which excludes everything in the half-open interval (0,1].
Given this, it follows that 'MIGHT & MIGHT NOT' (MM) propositions are hardly informative at all because they only exclude the extremes of the closed interval from [0,1].
What I'd like to suggest, however, is that most of the MM propositions that God knows have a built-in probability specification. Let E be an arbitrary future contingent event. Let F1, F2, ... , Fn be all of the causally relevant factors that are now in place and which pertain to the occurrence or non-occurrence of E. In these terms I would say that God not only knows that E might and might not occur, but God also knows something like this: "Given F1, F2, ... , Fn, the probability of E's occurring is P" (where P takes a value other than either 0 or 1). And that proposition is every bit as informative as its WILL (prob=1) or WILL NOT (prob=0) counterparts.
In the classical square of opposition we oppose the relatively non-informative SOME to ALL and NONE not because we want to exclude more informative quantifiers like "few", "many", "most", "90%", "4 out of 5", and so forth, but because we want to simplify to the logical basics. Similarly, when Tom and I speak of MM propositions without an explicit probability qualifier, it should not be assumed that we construe God's knowledge of future contingents solely in bare, unqualified MM terms. We're just simplifying to get at the basic logical distinctions between WILL, MIGHT, etc. Of course, God knows all the probabilities too.Post Edited (Alan Rhoda) : 3/4/2008 3:47:26 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 3/5/2008 12:55 AM (GMT -6) | | Thanks Alan. You know what Alan? I'm thinking that the debate over open theism is really a debate about the nature of the PRESENT, not the future!
Duigan: Information theory says that information is gained when there is a reduction in uncertainty, an elimination of possibilities, the actualization of one possibility to the exclusion of others.
Tom: I don’t have a problem with this if the uncertainties regard present realities and truths (about the past, present, or future) grounded in the present; that’s where all ‘information’ resides. So understood against, say, a general correspondence theory of truth, or the notion that truth supervenes on being, if the location of ‘information’ is the present, then that where we measure ‘uncertainty’ as well. Certainty/uncertain can only describe one’s apprehension of the fully determinate present nature of things. So to ever be uncertain about what the truth is would, I’d agree, constitute a failure of knowledge, a failure to grasp information, because there is information there.
But this doesn’t seem to be your problem. Your issue is with the ‘information’ content of ‘might/might not’ propositions. You feel these props are void of information.
What information would you like to see in them Duigan? Information conveying truth about how the future will in fact play out? No such information is available. The information which might/might not props convey is all the information there is. They’re not void of information because they fail to convey truth about how the future will in fact play out. On the contrary, ‘How the future will in fact play out’ is what is void of information so to speak.
If information theory wants to say there’s a genuine ‘lack of information’ that inheres in the knowledge of objective probabilities about the future, then I’ll just disagree.
Duigan: This I agree with: a) To not be certain about how the future will actually play out is no failure of knowledge. Not this: b) To know what ‘might and might not’ occur has plenty of information content.
Tom: Well, 50% agreement is good! ;o) We agree that there is no uncertainty in God with respect to the truth about the future.
Duigan: I'm only interested in the measurement of the "might and might not" information. And it's content is 0 until an event occurs
Tom: If information is a measure of the decrease of uncertainty, AND if information is always grounded in present realities, then one can only be more or less certain OF PRESENT REALITY and the truth that reality grounds. So the determinate present is the standard by which we measure certainty/uncertainty with respect to all information. That’s what I’m saying. If you’re interested, as you say, in the “measurement of ‘might/might not’ information,” look NOT to the future, look to the present. The ‘standard of measurement’ IS the present and the ‘content of the information’ you seek IS ‘might/might not’. That IS the determinate matter of fact, the information, against which we measure certainty levels.
Tom
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Alan Rhoda
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Date Joined May 2002
Total Posts : 680
| Posted 3/5/2008 1:10 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom: You know what Alan? I'm thinking that the debate over open theism is really a debate about the nature of the PRESENT, not the future!
Alan: The two issues - the nature of the present and the nature of the future - are closely connected, I think. If one accepts (a) theism, (b) a presentist metaphysics of time, (c) future contingency, and (d) that truth supervenes on being, then the only consistent position is open theism. The presentist metaphysics is important, because it means that the only realities for any truths to supervene on are present realities. It goes hand-in-hand with a Peircean tense logic. And the commitment to future contingency can be cashed out in terms of the indeterministic nature of present causal powers, dispositions, etc. | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 3/5/2008 5:12 AM (GMT -6) | | |
Duigan-
Let’s try this, a step at a time.
Take the parts of the equation:
Actuality—
The present universe in its totality, God and Creation included. This is the ‘reality’ that ‘grounds’ truth.
Information—
The content of all propositional knowledge. We might otherwise just say ‘truth’. Or would you say ‘information’ and ‘truth’ are distinct entities? If so, what would you suggest is the difference?
Knowledge—
Without getting into drawn out disputes over theories of knowledge, would you agree that knowledge amounts to something like the apprehension of truth or information? An omniscient knower apprehends all the truth/information there is about actuality/reality. His knowledge is co-terminous with reality.
*Certainty/Uncertainty Index—
You said ‘information’ is the “measure of the decrease of uncertainty” regarding the information content of the world. So you link ‘certainty/uncertainy’ to ‘how much information one knows’. That’s cool. But this means that uncertainty must, on your view, entail ignorance (on the assumption that certainty/uncertainty is a measure of one’s apprehension of information or truth). So to be uncertain is not to know. We may need to tweak this. In any case, Alan and I would insist that God is never ‘uncertain’ about either the accuracy or scope of his information regarding the world. The question is what to make of God’s not knowing ‘how future contingents will actually play out’. Is ‘uncertainty’ the best way to describe God’s not knowing this? Not if we link “uncertainty” to “how much information one knows” which means uncertainty implies ignorance.
Presentism—
Alan and I are presentists. We hold that only the present exists. The future and past are unreal. We’d fall under McTaggart’s A-Series (or ‘tensed’) time-theory as opposed to his B-Series (or ‘untensed’) time theory. On our view, past and future entities are logical constructs that are either true or false given the present state of reality.
Truth Grounding—
Alan and I believe that truth is grounded in reality, that truth supervenes on being. So for every true proposition, there is some present, actual state of affairs responsible for making that proposition true. All propositions are grounded in present states of affairs (given presentism). So we are very divided with Chaz over the relationship between ontology and semantics, between reality and truth, between the way the world actually is and what the truth about the world is. Alan and I say truth/semantics FOLLOWS ontology. Chaz denies any connection between truth and the objective world. Or if he holds to a connection, he either doesn’t know what the connection is or won’t say.
Indeterminsm—
What does it mean to say some future state of affairs is a “future contingent”? Contrary to Chaz, Alan pointed out that the contingency in question is ‘causal’ in nature. We are concerned with the ‘causal’ relationship between the present and any proposed future state of affairs. This is indeterminism objective status as a feature of reality. We are THEN concerned with what semantics best expresses the truth/information about such future contingents.
All of the above are crucial building blocks in our theory of truth, tense, and semantics.
Are the preceding brief definitions agreeable? If not, let’s get clarity. Once we’re clear on the terms, then we’ll apply it all to “might and might not” propositions and see where we stand.
Fair enough?
Comment: Our semantics of will, will not, and might/might not perfectly follows our views on all these core building blocks. Given our beliefs about these essential parts of the equation, our way of talking about the future follows consistently.
You have one of two avenues to undermine our case: (1) Show that our semantics (of will, will not, and might/might not) cannot possibly follow from these core commitments, or (2) prove one or more of these core commitments to be false. (*Note: I put an * asteryx next to the Certainty/Uncertainty Index because you introduced this, Duigan. It’s not a core commitment of our view per se, but we’re happy to discuss it. I don’t think I or Alan would disagree that God’s belief states have a certainty/uncertainty value in the sense propositions have truth values. That is, we’d agree God is justifiably certain of his knowledge. But we haven’t incorporated information theory’s claims about such an index into our arguments. We’ve just taken it for granted.)
Alan?
Tom
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Duigan MacBoyd
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Date Joined May 2007
Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/5/2008 9:04 AM (GMT -6) | |
Alan Rhoda said...
What I'd like to suggest, however, is that most of the MM propositions that God knows have a built-in probability specification. Let E be an arbitrary future contingent event. Let F1, F2, ... , Fn be all of the causally relevant factors that are now in place and which pertain to the occurrence or non-occurrence of E. In these terms I would say that God not only knows that E might and might not occur, but God also knows something like this: "Given F1, F2, ... , Fn, the probability of E's occurring is P" (where P takes a value other than either 0 or 1). And that proposition is every bit as informative as its WILL (prob=1) or WILL NOT (prob=0) counterparts.
Actually, Shannon's formula includes probabilities for each 'possibility', I just gave examples of equal probabilities, a fair coin toss, a fair die toss.
Information entropy (H) is the sum of all the terms, each probability i times log2 of 1 divided by the probability i or equivalently
The fair die toss being (.1667 * -log2(.1667)) + (.1667 * -log2(.1667)) + (.1667 * -log2(.1667)) + (.1667 * -log2(.1667)) + (.1667 * -log2(.1667)) + (.1667 * -log2(.1667))
which is 2.58 bits of information.
Some call the term  the "surprisal". With probability of 1, you're not surprised to see the result. A low probability has a high surprisal, and thus more information gained if it happens.
I'll try and get back to the rest later, my daughter was hit by an automobile at her uni yesterday so we were down the emergency room last night. She seems all right, this is her second time being hit by an auto while at school there. I guess we didn't teach her well enough to look both ways before crossing the street.
Post Edited (Duigan MacBoyd) : 3/6/2008 11:12:51 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Duigan MacBoyd
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Date Joined May 2007
Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/6/2008 11:57 AM (GMT -6) | | |
Alan:
Informativeness has to do with excluding possibilities. That seems right. It follows that 'WILL' and 'WILL NOT' propositions are maximally informative because (on the Peircean interpretation) they exclude all but one possibility. Thus,
WILL implies a probability of 1, which excludes everything in the half-open interval [0,1).
WILL NOT implies a probability of 0, which excludes everything in the half-open interval (0,1].
Duigan:
You’re correct on “will” and “will not”.
Using the coin toss example, let's say it's weighted so that it will only land on heads, that would give us your "will" example for heads and your "will not" for tails.
The probability of heads is 1, the probability of tails is 0.
H = (1 * -log2(1)) + (0 * -log2(0))
H = (1 * 0) + 0
H = 0, there is no information gained because, as you said, they are "maximally informative"
Alan:
What I'd like to suggest, however, is that most of the MM propositions that God knows have a built-in probability specification. Let E be an arbitrary future contingent event. Let F1, F2, ... , Fn be all of the causally relevant factors that are now in place and which pertain to the occurrence or non-occurrence of E. In these terms I would say that God not only knows that E might and might not occur, but God also knows something like this: "Given F1, F2, ... , Fn, the probability of E's occurring is P" (where P takes a value other than either 0 or 1). And that proposition is every bit as informative as its WILL (prob=1) or WILL NOT (prob=0) counterparts.
Duigan:
Now that I've had time to look at this, it appears to be just a restatement of the problem.
Using a coin that’s weighted for probability .8 for heads and .2 for tails:
H = (.8 * -log2(.8)) + (.2 * -log2(.2))
H = (.8 * .322) + (.2 * 2.32)
H = 0.2576 + 0.464
H = 0.7216 bits of information gained (due to the higher probability of one of the options)
Alan:
And that proposition is every bit as informative as its WILL (prob=1) or WILL NOT (prob=0) counterparts.
Duigan:
Alas, it isn’t.
An event with prob=1 and prob=0 counterparts yields no more information once the event is actualized.
An event with 0 < probabilities < 1 yields more information once the event is actualized.
But maybe that's what you're saying. God has all the information currently available and once new information is produced, acquires that.
Post Edited (Duigan MacBoyd) : 3/6/2008 11:05:01 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Duigan MacBoyd
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Date Joined May 2007
Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/6/2008 3:27 PM (GMT -6) | |
HumanHypostasis said...Duigan: An event with prob=1 and prob=0 counterparts yields no more information once the event is actualized. An event with 0 < probabilities < 1 yields more information once the event is actualized. But maybe that's what you're saying. God has all the information currently available and once new information is produced, acquires that. Tom: Yes! That's what we're saying. If truth (and information) is a measure of the sentient apprehension of PRESENT reality, then the present objecitve probabilities ARE the fullest information-yeild available. Once the event is actualized, THAT present reality will yield its own information content. Your daughter OK? T
She seems to be O.K. she slept all day yesterday and skipped all classes. thanks
Don't Molinists believe that God comprehends all possible worlds but knows which one has been actualized (because He actualized it Himself)?
And could one say that your view is akin to God comprehending all possible worlds but not knowing which one is being actualized?
I'm not trying to make a point here, just curious.
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 3/6/2008 4:19 PM (GMT -6) | | Duigan: But maybe that's what you're saying. God has all the information currently available and once new information is produced, acquires that.
Alan: That sounds right to me. Once something reaches the WILL or WILL NOT stage it's probability is fixed. The only information update for God at that point concerns the passage of time - at some point the future tense WILL will become a present tense IS and then a past tense WAS.
The probabilities of MM propositions, in contrast, are not fixed, but can change as reality changes. They might oscillate for a while before eventually become a WILL or a WILL NOT or an IS or an IS NOT.
Duigan: Don't Molinists believe that God comprehends all possible worlds but knows which one has been actualized (because He actualized it Himself)?
Alan Yes, that's right, though they would draw a further distinction between 'possible worlds' and 'feasible worlds'. God cannot actualize just any possible world because the counterfactuals of freedom that Molinist posit limit God's options.
Duigan: And could one say that your view is akin to God comprehending all possible worlds but not knowing which one is being actualized?
Alan: Sort of. It depends on whether one takes a 'possible world' to include a complete history from creation to eschaton such that it's actualization stretches over time, or on whether one takes a possible world to be a maximal state of affairs obtaining at a time.
Given the first construal, we would say that there is no such thing as 'the actual world'. There is no unique possible world that is, right now, going to be realized in toto.
Given the second construal, we would say that there is a unique actual world and God knows which possible world it is, but it's going to be replaced by a different possible world as time passes and contingencies are resolved. In other words, history is a continuous sequence of different possible worlds.
Hope that helps. And I'm glad to hear that your daughter's seems OK. | | Back to Top | | |
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Duigan MacBoyd
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Date Joined May 2007
Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/6/2008 9:48 PM (GMT -6) | |
Duigan: And could one say that your view is akin to God comprehending all possible worlds but not knowing which one is being actualized?
Alan: Sort of. It depends on whether one takes a 'possible world' to include a complete history from creation to eschaton such that it's actualization stretches over time, or on whether one takes a possible world to be a maximal state of affairs obtaining at a time.
Given the first construal, we would say that there is no such thing as 'the actual world'. There is no unique possible world that is, right now, going to be realized in toto.
Given the second construal, we would say that there is a unique actual world and God knows which possible world it is, but it's going to be replaced by a different possible world as time passes and contingencies are resolved. In other words, history is a continuous sequence of different possible worlds.
Hope that helps. And I'm glad to hear that your daughter's seems OK.
The first seems more static and the second more dynamic.
That helps, thanks for the dialogue.
Post Edited (Duigan MacBoyd) : 3/6/2008 8:52:13 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Duigan MacBoyd
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Total Posts : 24
| Posted 3/7/2008 11:54 AM (GMT -6) | |
Chaz Finney said...
The Open View OV of bivalence is vacuous and logically impossible:
Consider the proposition “It is true today that there will be a sea battle tomorrow” or to disambiguate this “It is true at t0 that there will be a sea battle at t1”
The OV will state: Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times. That is, they are bivalent. And: Props do become true (and false) when the states of affairs they describe obtain or fail to obtain. Do you deny there is true ‘becoming’ in the actual world?
Here is the problem, the OV states that the truth or falsity at t0 of a proposition is grounded in the future event occurring at t1, but if t1 doesn’t exist (as they claim) then it is logically impossible to have a truth value of true or false at t0, hence their view of bivalence is logically impossible and vacuous. There exists no logically possible world in which something that is true or false today is grounded (receives its truth or falsity) in a future event that has not occurred or doesn’t exist (according to their view) tomorrow. In short there exists "nothing" to give this proposition a truth value today. Based on the OV it is logically impossible for propositions to be true or false at all times, that is they are bivalent. Might and might not, will and will not are not truth values in logic.
I would encourage all interested parties to study the laws of logic and bivalence apart from any theological prospective and understand unbiased logic and reasoning. Don't take my word or Alan's; study the logic...
Chaz
Chaz, here's how I see it:
W = There will be a sea battle tomorrow.
What grounds the truth value (true or false) of W now? Certainly not the event, it doesn't exist, now.
Whatever you say now, could be contradicted by what actually happens tomorrow.
If you say it's true, no sea battle tomorrow would contradict your assertion.
If you say it's false, a sea battle tomorrow would contradict your assertion.
M = There might be a sea battle tomorrow.
What grounds the truth value (true or false) of this? Current reality.
Currently there are seas and battle ships of competing nations in close enough proximity for a sea battle tomorrow. Enough that's there's a probability of there being a sea battle tomorrow. Whether there is a battle or not, "there might be a battle" is currently true. There is no way to prove M false, tomorrow, other than showing there had to be a sea battle or not.
That's why it appeared to me that "might and might not" doesn't really contain any information.
Let's simplify.
W = This coin will land on heads. Can this be proved false? Yes, it lands tails.
M = This coin might land on heads. Can this be proved false? No, if it lands on tails, we'd just say, "we only said it 'might' land on heads".
W cannot be grounded. It's being flipped hasn't happened yet.
M can be grounded. I have a coin with heads on one side.
However, if I had a coin with heads on both sides, M would be false. W would be true.
Post Edited (Duigan MacBoyd) : 3/7/2008 11:05:31 AM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 3/7/2008 12:10 PM (GMT -6) | | |
Chaz, your posts now border on ridiculous. Come on.
Chaz: The Open View OV of bivalence is vacuous and logically impossible:
Tom: Like I said, I’ll engage you for the entertainment value!
Chaz: Consider the proposition “It is true today that there will be a sea battle tomorrow” or to disambiguate this “It is true at t0 that there will be a sea battle at t1” The OV will state: Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times.
Tom: They are at all times either true or false, right. There’s never a time at which any proposition is not either true or false. And actually, Chaz, only SOME open theists make this claim. OTHER open theists adopt a multi-valued semantic.
Chaz: The OV will state: Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times. That is, they are bivalent. And: Props do become true (and false)…
Tom: No prop can become true AND false. It’s true OR false. And the point is not that they go from having no truth value to having a truth value of either ‘true’ or ‘false’. The point is that they go from having the truth value of ‘false’ to having the truth value of ‘true’ OR from having the truth value of ‘true’ to having the truth value of ‘false’.
It’s called bivalence.
Chaz: …when the states of affairs they describe obtain or fail to obtain.
Tom: Chaz, do you even read my posts? The ‘states of affairs’ here are the present TRUTH GROUNDS of the proposition (at t0), not the future states of affairs (at t1) named in the prop. I already addressed this.
Chaz: Here is the problem, the OV states that the truth or falsity at t0 of a proposition is grounded in the future event occurring at t1…
Tom: NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.
The truth of a proposition at t0 is grounded in the state of reality at t0. We never said it was grounded in the FUTURE event.
Chaz: …but if t1 doesn’t exist (as they claim) then it is logically impossible to have a truth value of true or false at t0…
Tom: We don’t claim that propositions asserted at t0 are grounded by t1 realities. We’ve NEVER said that. Propositions asserted at t0 are grounded to t0 realities.
Chaz: Might and might not, will and will not are not truth values in logic.
Tom: Of course they’re not. We never claimed they were. “True” and “false” are the truth values in a bivalent semantic. Might and might not, will and will not are just tense operators for propositions (not truth ‘values’). I already said this several times.
Chaz: I would encourage all interested parties to study the laws of logic and bivalence apart from any theological prospective and understand unbiased logic and reasoning. Don't take my word or Alan's; study the logic...
Tom: Chaz, I challenge you here and now to state YOUR definition of bivalence. I’ll start with mine:
Principle of Bivalence (PB): For any proposition p, p is either true or false.
There. That’s it. Do you disagree with this definition of bivalence? If not, then get with the conversation. If so, then get with the conversation.
Tom
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Alan Rhoda
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| Posted 3/7/2008 1:23 PM (GMT -6) | | Chaz: The OV will state: Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times.
Alan: "Either true or false at all times" is ambiguous between "(Either true or false) at all times" and "Either (true at all times) or (false at all times)." Obviously, we affirm the former interpretation and not the latter.
Chaz: That is, they are bivalent.
Alan: The principle of bivalence says nothing about whether truth values are temporally invariant or not. All it says is that every proposition has a truth value, only one truth value, and a truth value that is a member of this set {true, false}.
Chaz: And [the OV will state:] Props do become true (and false) when the states of affairs they describe obtain or fail to obtain.
Alan: Imprecise. Your statement suggests that a prop might start out with no truth value and then later acquire one. If that's what you mean, then you don't understand our view (Tom's and mine). Some open theists do deny bivalence, but it's not a necessary consequence of open theism per se. You should be more careful when speaking about what "the" OV is committed to.
Chaz: Here is the problem, the OV states that the truth or falsity at t0 of a proposition is grounded in the future event occurring at t1…
Alan: Tom's reply was right on the money: "NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO." The truth or falsity at t0 of a proposition is grounded in what obtains at t0.
Chaz: I would encourage all interested parties to study the laws of logic and bivalence.
Alan: Good advice, but your persistent insistence that the laws of logic and bivalence are even an issue in our debate - they aren't - reflects an obstinate refusal on your part to seriously engage with us. You seem to like taking pot shots at straw men instead. | | Back to Top | | |
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 3/7/2008 1:45 PM (GMT -6) | | Tom: The point is that they go from having the truth value of ‘false’ to having the truth value of ‘true’ OR from having the truth value of ‘true’ to having the truth value of ‘false’.
Alan: Right, Tom. To spell it out a little more:
(1) A future-oriented MIGHT/MIGHT NOT proposition can go from being 'true' to being 'false' but not vice-versa. Once it's false it's always false.
(2) Before the occurrence of the specified event, a WILL proposition can go from being 'false' to being 'true', but not vice-versa.
(3) After the occurrence of the specified event, every WILL proposition becomes 'false' and is always false thereafter. | | Back to Top | | |
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Chaz Finney
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Total Posts : 102
| Posted 3/7/2008 2:52 PM (GMT -6) | | Again, an attempt to skirt the issues through a fog of verbiage and re-defining principles of logic... If the proposition cannot POSSIBLY have a truth value at t0 because it is grounded in a future event that according to the OV doesn't exist; then this proposition CANNOT be "either true or false" at t0 as TOM posited "Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times. That is, they are bivalent."
YES YES YES this is what Tom has claimed, to quote him: he has said that what makes the proposition true <Chaz will wear a green shirt at t1> is indeed Chaz wearing a green shirt at t1, which is a future event grounding the truth.
There are no degrees of truth. will, will not, might. might not... I don't expect you to back off of your position because of what you have invested in your theology; however the theme of this post is the "Chink in the armour" of the OV. Repost: The Open View OV of bivalence is vacuous and logically impossible:
Consider the proposition “It is true today that there will be a sea battle tomorrow” or to disambiguate this “It is true at t0 that there will be a sea battle at t1”
The OV will state: Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times. That is, they are bivalent. And: Props do become true (and false) when the states of affairs they describe obtain or fail to obtain. Do you deny there is true ‘becoming’ in the actual world?
Here is the problem, the OV states that the truth or falsity at t0 of a proposition is grounded in the future event occurring at t1, but if t1 doesn’t exist (as they claim) then it is logically impossible to have a truth value of true or false at t0, hence their view of bivalence is logically impossible and vacuous. There exists no logically possible world in which something that is true or false today is grounded (receives its truth or falsity) in a future event that has not occurred or doesn’t exist (according to their view) tomorrow. In short there exists "nothing" to give this proposition a truth value today. Based on the OV it is logically impossible for propositions to be true or false at all times, that is they are bivalent. Might and might not, will and will not are not truth values in logic.
I would encourage all interested parties to study the laws of logic and bivalence apart from any theological prospective and understand unbiased logic and reasoning. Don't take my word or Alan's; study the logic...Post Edited (Chaz Finney) : 3/7/2008 3:12:43 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 3/7/2008 3:51 PM (GMT -6) | | |
I typed these comments up and then got back on and noticed Alan beat me to it! But since I typed ‘em up I’ll go ahead and post.
Alan, I think Duigan has given us (in ‘information theory’) something we’ll (or you’ll, since you gotsa da brains) want to incorporate in our articulation of things. It’d be nice to work through a more thoughtful, studied reply.
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Duigan: Chaz, here's how I see it: W = There will be a sea battle tomorrow. What grounds the truth value (true or false) of W now? Certainly not the event, it doesn't exist, now.
Tom: Right. But you don’t say what does ground its truth value now. Given my support of bivalence, I think that if true, something does now ground that truth.
Duigan: Whatever you say now, could be contradicted by what actually happens tomorrow.
Tom: On a bivalent presentist worldview, a proposition can only be ‘contradicted’ by the truth of its contradictory proposition at the time its asserted because that’s the only time at which propositional truth values obtain.
So if <There will be a sea battle tomorrow> is true now, then there being a sea battle tomorrow is causally entailed by states of affairs that obtain today. That’s what ‘will’ means (on a Peircean view).
Duigan: If you say it's true, no sea battle tomorrow would contradict your assertion. If you say it's false, a sea battle tomorrow would contradict your assertion.
Tom: If it’s true that there will be a sea battle tomorrow, then no contradictory state of affairs will come to pass, for a true ‘S will occur’ means reality is now causally closed with regard to S's occuring.
Duigan: M = There might be a sea battle tomorrow. What grounds the truth value (true or false) of this? Current reality.
Tom: Right.
Duigan: Currently there are seas and battle ships of competing nations in close enough proximity for a sea battle tomorrow. Enough that's there's a probability of there being a sea battle tomorrow. Whether there is a battle or not, "there might be a battle" is currently true. There is no way to prove M false…
Tom: Well, there might be seas, and ships, and the required proximity, indeed ALL the necessary physical requirements and yet it be FALSE that there might be a sea battle tomorrow if other conditions preclude the possibility. More than just the available entities of the proposed event is required to ground genuine possibilities. Who knows, God may know today that he’s planning on worldwide storms at sea tomorrow that will make all seas unsafe. That would mean <There will not be a sea battle tomorrow> is true today and <There might be sea battle tomorrow> false today.
Duigan: W = This coin will land on heads. Can this be proved false? Yes, it lands tails.
Tom: On our view, Duigan, all truth is grounded in the present. So <This coin will land on heads> can be contradicted only by present states of affairs.
Duigan: M = This coin might land on heads. Can this be proved false? No, if it lands on tails, we'd just say, "we only said it 'might' land on heads."
Tom: There’s no retroactive causation. So whatever the coin turns up can’t retroactively affect the truth value of props asserting what will, will not, or might/might not be the case. The coin lands or doesn’t land heads or tails consequent upon the nature of antecedent causal factors. And it’s those antecedent causal factors which grounded (or not) the truth of whatever tense operator (will, will not, or might/might not) truthfully expressed those factors.
Duigan: W cannot be grounded. It's being flipped hasn't happened yet.
Tom: But what hasn’t happened ‘yet’ has no bearing on the truth of propositions asserted in the present. Truth is grounded in the present.
Let’s try this. Let’s talk about the objective nature of determinacy and indeterminacy regarding the present state of reality and its becoming. You’ve got three basic probabilities: 1, 0, and all those probabilities in between (greater than 0 and less than 1). 1 = will, or causally entailed/determined to occur; 0 = will not, or causally precluded/determined not to occur; and then greater than 0 and less than 1 = might/might not, or indeterminate. These are NOT truth values, they’re dispositions of the objective world, ways the world is which ground the truth (or not) or propositions.
So ‘might’ = ‘with a probability of greater than 0’. That’s all. And ‘might not’ = ‘with a probability of less than 1’. Will = ‘with a probability of 1’ and ‘will not’ = ‘with a probability of 0’. Does that help?
If some future event has a probability of 1 of occurring, it can’t not occur given the way the world is. That’s was 1 means. If it has a probability of 0 of occurring, it can’t occur. That’s what 0 means. If it’s indeterminate, it has a probability of greater than 0 and less than 1 of occurring, so whether it happens or not, it occurs indeterminately. Its happening does not THEN retroactively entail the truth of ‘will’ at all times prior to its occurring. And if it does not occur (indeterminately), its not happening does not THEN retroactively entail the truth of ‘will not’ at all times prior to its not happening.
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Chaz: Again, an attempt to skirt the issues through a fog of verbiage and re-defining principles of logic... If the proposition cannot POSSIBLY have a truth value at t0 because it is grounded in a future event that according to the OV doesn't exist…
Tom: We don’t say the proposition’s truth value is grounded in future events that don’t exist.
Chaz: …then this proposition CANNOT be "either true or false" at t0 as TOM posited "Future-tense propositions are either true or false at all times. That is, they are bivalent."
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Chaz: YES YES YES this is what Tom has claimed, to quote him..:
Tom: Oh good, a quote of mine. Let’s see it…
Chaz: [Tom] has said that what makes the proposition true <Chaz will wear a green shirt at t1> is indeed Chaz wearing a green shirt at t1.
Tom: First of all, this isn’t a ‘quote’. It’s your own poorly rephrased whatever. But since you’re trying to quote me, why not just give us the page number in this thread and the date of the post in question. I’d like to see where I actually said “What makes the proposition <Chaz will wear a green shirt at t1> true is indeed Chaz[‘s] wearing a green shirt at t1.” Just take me to quote in question.
I did say this: “In the case of a future tense prop, say, <Chaz will do S in Y at time t>, this prop is true or false at the time I assert it depending NOT on the states of affairs named in the prop (your doing S in Y at t), but rather on states of affairs that obtain right now which either causally entail or preclude (or leave indeterminate) your doing S in Y at t.”
I also said (in agreement with Swartz's arguments) that the prop <Chaz IS wearing a green shirt> is grounded in Chaz’s actually wearing a green shirt. But after rereading all my posts (I might have missed it) I didn’t see where I said “<Chaz WILL wear a green shirt at t1> is grounded in Chaz’s wearing a green shirt at t1.” My view is that this proposition, if true, is grounded by some causally closed disposition of the present world regarding Chaz’s wearing a green shirt at t1. If you can produce this ‘quote’ of me, I’ll be happy to own up to expressing myself poorly, even mistakenly. But let’s have the quote first.
Chaz, you must allow people the right to clarify and interpret themselves. Those are the rules of fair debate. I get to say what I mean, not you. So please produce the page of this thread and the particular post where this quote you attribute to me is found. If not, admit you missed it. If not that, then excuse yourself from the conversation.
Either paint of get off the ladder.
Sorry to speak so, but all of us are busy and want to use the time we have on this board to engage profitably in fair debate, not argue with someone who can’t or doesn’t want to follow the conversation.
Tom
Post Edited (Tom) : 3/7/2008 3:05:05 PM (GMT-6) | | Back to Top | | |
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Chaz Finney
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2008
Total Posts : 102
| Posted 3/7/2008 5:53 PM (GMT -6) | | We've been debating these issues on two threads now for several weeks; so it is not as if I haven't elaborated on any of my positions. No need to comment any further these are simply my closing comments and assesments of the OV and the implications the OV's assumptions.
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Chaz Finney
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Date Joined Jan 2008
Total Posts : 102
| Posted 3/7/2008 6:00 PM (GMT -6) | | | Done sir, I have addressed the issues that I set out to. | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 3/7/2008 6:52 PM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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