From: Robbie Lindauer (robblin@thetip.org)
Date: Fri Sep 12 2003 - 14:56:18 MDT
On Friday, September 12, 2003, at 10:59 AM, Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
> Like hell they are not (deterministic) -- its pretty clear at this
> point
> if you have certain mutations in the p53 gene (or a number of other
> tumor
> suppressor genes) they will become nonfunctional and you will likely
> develop cancer at some point.
Obviously you don't know the meaning of "non-deterministic"
"likely ... at some point" are "non-deterministic" phraseology.
Consider the opposite:
"Definitely at 3:00pm" - that would be determinism.
>
>> On this I think we all agree. Take away the toxins - who knows.
>> Take
>> away the age - who knows. After that it's ALL conjecture.
>
> As has been noted, some low level of toxins may be helpful.
> it will *not* be a "who knows" situation
> in the future when we have that technological capability.
It's hard to say whether or not this is an epistemological lack or an
ontological "missing piece". I've heard that the human eye can
distinguish difference of light intensity of 10 photons. (I think JR
Lucas said this, I don't know where he got his data).
In any case, it may be strictly speaking NON-DETERMINISTIC whether or
not someone will get cancer. It may not. But right now since the
underlying physics of EVERYTHING is non-deterministic, we should expect
it simply to be non-deterministic even in the case of higher-level
biology.
As far as I know Hume's criticism of "deterministic causation" qua
constant conjunction is still a devestating argument against causal
determinism. In statistical sciences (like epidemiology) it's
axiomatic.
That there's a possibility that in the future our underlying theory of
everything might change is always a negligible possibility. There's no
concrete proposal there to be asserted or denied.
Best,
robbie
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