If there will be a sea battle tomorrow, and someone says "there will be a sea battle tomorrow" then that sentence is true, even before the sea battle occurs. But given that the sentence is true, the sea battle could not fail to take place. This argument can be rejected by denying that predictions about the future have to be true or false when they are made - ie, rejecting bivalence for sentences about the future. In other words, if there is a fork in the road, it can be said you will go left or you will go right. So;
1) There exist now propositions about everything that might happen in the future.
2) Every proposition is either true or else false.
3) If you accept statements 1) and 2), then there exists now a set of true propositions that, taken together, correctly predict everything that will happen in the future.
4) If there exists now a set of true propositions that, taken together, correctly predict everything that will happen in the future, then whatever will happen in the future is already unavoidable.
2007-03-08 11:54:41 · 9 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ Philosophy
You contradict yourself because you assume that one can predict what will happen in the future and then you conclude that what will happen in the future is unavoidable. If what will happen in the future is predictable, certainly it won't be unavoidable.
Your argument is valid but unsound. The problem is with statement 3). No one can predict everything that will happen in the future.
2007-03-08 12:20:35 · answer #1 · answered by browneyedgirl90 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Ah... I seem to have read the same argument in an article on fatalism the other day. But they neglect another possible flaw in the argument which I happen to favour:
If there is no such thing as the future, then your original statement is meaningless... just as if you had said, "there will be a sea battle unicorn". Even if you try to parse statements with no meaning whatsoever, the best you could probably do would be to mark them as false. And thus every statement about the future is false.
If the battle does eventually occur, then it's not happening in the FUTURE, it happens in the PRESENT. Thus, "there is a sea battle going on now" can be true even if the future statement was false.
A linguist might also point out that most of the statements of the kind you mention have implied clauses that are just not part of the overt declaration. So if the statement really is "I THINK there will be sea battle tomorrow" then it's quite possible for any number of those statements to be true without having any actual reflection on the actual nature of the universe in the future (if there is such a thing). If it is impossible to make a statement of fact without opinion, you are also removed from your crisis.
The biggest problem I have with the whole thing lies in the nature of defining things into and out of existance. Science has been a little too effective for me to not have many ideas poisoned by the concept of empiricism... maybe instead of trying to figure out how the universe works and then fitting observations into that framework, we should observe first and then explain what we observe. No matter how iron-clad a chain of logic you build, you can't reason gravity into stopping. Nor does it seem an appropriate use of evaluations of true or false to demonstrate that everything is predetermined.
That's what I think anyway. Hopefully worth what you paid for. Heh.
2007-03-08 20:18:51 · answer #2 · answered by Doctor Why 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋
"If there exists now a set of true propositions that, taken together, correctly predict everything that will happen in the future, then whatever will happen in the future is already unavoidable."
I accept that there now exists a set of propositions that, when taken together, correctly describe everything that will happen in the future. What I do not accept is that these propositions can be thought of as consistently 'true' or 'untrue' from moment to moment. The 'set' of true propositions is as likely to be fluid and changeable as it is to be static and pre-determined, i.e. resulting in an 'unavoidable' future. It is possible that the truth of any proposition only becomes permanently determined when the predicted event occurs or does not occur.
I am, of course, a great believer in free-will :)
2007-03-08 20:33:05 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
True prophecy is to describe a future reality that is seen through an instrument with temporal capabilities. It is a snapshot that doesn't reveal the actions that caused the reality.
In your sea battle scenario, the individual who states that "there will be a sea battle tomorrow" is expressing a planned event that is already known. This individual is not expressing a premonition but an expectation based upon known information.
Because the event has not yet happened, this statement is neither true nor false - it is an opinion of belief that is expressed by someone who will not cause the event to take place.
A prediction about the future is both true and false when it is made - the possibility and impossibility of that future being consistent with the prediction.
Because of the principle that the future is created by present actions, it is possible to project future possibilities based upon the trajectory of what is presently known.
For example, the Iraq War was projected to take place based upon the build-up of military troops months in advance, the world-wide protest of the war before it took place, and the history of Saddam Hussein throwing out the weapons inspectors, which led up to U.N. Resolution 1441, which initiated the build-up of the military troops that were being sent to enforce U.N. Resolution 1441.
2007-03-08 19:57:56 · answer #4 · answered by Q 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
It seems that you are implying that this is a good argument for determinism. However, where it seems to fail is that it does not actually determine everything. All that it is actually saying is that given that something must happen and that there is a finite amount of possibilities for what will happen, one of those possibilities must occur. This is not actually predicting WHAT will occur, it is simply predicting that SOMETHING will occur. As a result, what you say may be said to be true, but only in establishing that if there is a cause, there will be an effect. As a result, determinism is not completely established by this argument.
2007-03-08 20:08:48 · answer #5 · answered by John F 2 · 2⤊ 0⤋
No that's fuzzy logic. With statement 3, the set of true propositions doesn't exist until the events unfold. If I say "tomorrow I will go to the mall", you can't know whether or not that statement is (was) true until tomorrow. Until then it is an indeterminant form.
2007-03-08 20:03:43 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Why conplicate the future? We can predict and might be right a good part of the time. We also might be wrong. A healthy optisimn might be the thought for right now. Living in the present is all we have. Accept. Change what you can, accept what you can't change, be smart enough to know the difference. Live for today.
2007-03-08 21:23:04 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
When the statement is made, it can be neither true nor false because it is a statement about the future. All statements about the future are supposition.
2007-03-08 20:45:33 · answer #8 · answered by Freethinking Liberal 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
In the morning the sun will shine...lets all turn our TV to good morning america to see if Im right.
2007-03-08 23:14:55 · answer #9 · answered by contrary mary 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋