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Article 3697 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: markrose@spss.com (Mark Rosenfelder)
Subject: Determinism precludes truth?
Message-ID: <1992Feb12.205814.75156@spss.com>
Date: Wed, 12 Feb 1992 20:58:14 GMT
References: <1992Feb3.145332.21683@saifr00.cfsat.honeywell.com> <6554@pkmab.se> <407@tdatirv.UUCP>
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In article <407@tdatirv.UUCP> sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>Now, given that my 'knowledge' is thus predetermined, why should it have
>any meaningful relationship to truth or falsity?  Why whould I believe that
>my predetermined 'knowledge' has any meaning at all?

>I suspect that either the teleonomic aspect of evolved organisms guarentees
>a relationship between internal mental states and the external world, 

But what kind of relationship, that's the problem.  I could see that
evolution or the environment favor useful beliefs; but how could they
favor true beliefs?  (I trust you appreciate the distinction.)  But in
that case, is a belief in determinism true or merely useful?

>or the universe is not indeed fully deterministic.  I am not sure which.

Of course, the universe _isn't_ fully deterministic, according to the less
off-the-wall interpretations of quantum mechanics.  I'm not sure what this
does to Lewis's argument.



