Glenn, I love where you are taking this. While reading, I remembered another formidable 'ism '- Positivism. During philosophy classes that discussed Heidegger, Gadamer, and Derrida, this topic often arose as a source of considerable contention. I wonder if delving into this might give us some additional things to consider. While you have laid out the territory of determinism as "everything that happens is the inevitable result of what came before", positivism goes a step further in that direction to say "let's look at it, let's measure it and prove beyond doubt that this is so". So that causality may be demonstrated through empirical observation and logical reasoning —the two pillars that support the foundation of the scientific method. If determinism works through a strong belief in natural laws that govern everything, positivism is out to prove positively that these laws are beyond doubt. While they seem to be heading in the same direction, albeit on parallel tracks, the two are bound to each other by what they reject. They both reject the unknowable, the interpretive, and the contingent aspects of human experience—that which resists measurement, prediction, or formalisation. Determinism denies the radical openness of the future by asserting causal closure; positivism denies the legitimacy of anything that cannot be empirically verified or logically deduced. In doing so, both marginalise ambiguity, subjectivity, and the metaphysical, in a bid for certainty.
Together, they form a kind of epistemological and ontological alliance: determinism describes a world bound by necessity, and positivism polices the methods by which that necessity is recognised. Where determinism imagines the world as a completed script, positivism insists we can read that script line by line through observation and analysis. Their union, however, comes under strain when faced with human meaning, where the gesture, the metaphor, the unspeakable, or the undecidable takes centre stage. This is why thinkers like Heidegger, Gadamer, and Derrida repeatedly returned to language, interpretation, and finitude as evidence of a world that cannot be fully grasped, only dwelled in.
Sudipto, thank you for this! What a rich and resonant reflection. I love that you brought positivism into the conversation here. It absolutely deserves a seat at the table as a kind of epistemological companion to determinism. As you say, it doesn’t just assert causality, but seeks to verify it, certify it, and close the loop with confidence.
Your framing is spot on: if determinism claims the script is already written, positivism is the methodical reader, scanning each line for proof. But, as you so insightfully point out, both rest on an implicit rejection of the ambiguous, the ineffable, the interpretive. That whole world of meaning which can’t be measured, only lived (qualia, as opposed to quanta).
It raises a question that’s central to my own inquiry: What if agency, like meaning, doesn’t arise through explanation or measurement, but through participation? In other words, only through a lived relationship with a world we can’t fully objectify?
Thinkers like Heidegger were so right to question the supremacy and limits of representational knowledge. It’s a reminder of the idea that we don’t “know” a path into freedom or meaning so much as we “dwell” our way into it.
I am so grateful for your voice here, and for the whole constellation of thought you’re helping illuminate.
A fascinating piece and very well timed. At my retreat this week, we were learning about how to realize & manifest non-duality and someone asked Swami Sarvapriyananda about free will v. determinism in the context of ethical practices. Basically, if Vedanta says there's ultimately no free will, why do we need to care about ethics? He broke it down thusly:
(1) We certainly feel as though we have free will and the functioning of our society is based on that assumption.
(2) Even though it feels like we have free will, there's a lot of science, religion, etc that tells us about cause and effect, and that psychology shows that there are changes in the brain *before* a decision is made. Or as Vedanta would say, it's all existence-consciousness-bliss at the end of the day, and there's no actual "us" to do the doing.
So how do we square these?
(3) Regardless of whether we actually decide something or merely appear to decide, from an ethical perspective we should act as if we have free will but with the attitude of surrendering to God's will.
I actually found this to be helpful. As you lay out, determinism without a base layer of spirituality/surrender is far too depressing otherwise -- we might as well just sit on the couch and bingewatch Love Island
“…we should act as if we have free will but with the attitude of surrendering…” — I love that framing! Yes! Holding that paradox.
Whether we can ever “know” the certainty of it, we have to admit that we “feel” something like free will. And that felt sense means something. But to possess it as something we “own” … that it’s “my agency” might be the trap that we too often fall into. Strangely enough, to relinquish that clinging of “mine” might be what unlocks it.
Glenn, I love where you are taking this. While reading, I remembered another formidable 'ism '- Positivism. During philosophy classes that discussed Heidegger, Gadamer, and Derrida, this topic often arose as a source of considerable contention. I wonder if delving into this might give us some additional things to consider. While you have laid out the territory of determinism as "everything that happens is the inevitable result of what came before", positivism goes a step further in that direction to say "let's look at it, let's measure it and prove beyond doubt that this is so". So that causality may be demonstrated through empirical observation and logical reasoning —the two pillars that support the foundation of the scientific method. If determinism works through a strong belief in natural laws that govern everything, positivism is out to prove positively that these laws are beyond doubt. While they seem to be heading in the same direction, albeit on parallel tracks, the two are bound to each other by what they reject. They both reject the unknowable, the interpretive, and the contingent aspects of human experience—that which resists measurement, prediction, or formalisation. Determinism denies the radical openness of the future by asserting causal closure; positivism denies the legitimacy of anything that cannot be empirically verified or logically deduced. In doing so, both marginalise ambiguity, subjectivity, and the metaphysical, in a bid for certainty.
Together, they form a kind of epistemological and ontological alliance: determinism describes a world bound by necessity, and positivism polices the methods by which that necessity is recognised. Where determinism imagines the world as a completed script, positivism insists we can read that script line by line through observation and analysis. Their union, however, comes under strain when faced with human meaning, where the gesture, the metaphor, the unspeakable, or the undecidable takes centre stage. This is why thinkers like Heidegger, Gadamer, and Derrida repeatedly returned to language, interpretation, and finitude as evidence of a world that cannot be fully grasped, only dwelled in.
Sudipto, thank you for this! What a rich and resonant reflection. I love that you brought positivism into the conversation here. It absolutely deserves a seat at the table as a kind of epistemological companion to determinism. As you say, it doesn’t just assert causality, but seeks to verify it, certify it, and close the loop with confidence.
Your framing is spot on: if determinism claims the script is already written, positivism is the methodical reader, scanning each line for proof. But, as you so insightfully point out, both rest on an implicit rejection of the ambiguous, the ineffable, the interpretive. That whole world of meaning which can’t be measured, only lived (qualia, as opposed to quanta).
It raises a question that’s central to my own inquiry: What if agency, like meaning, doesn’t arise through explanation or measurement, but through participation? In other words, only through a lived relationship with a world we can’t fully objectify?
Thinkers like Heidegger were so right to question the supremacy and limits of representational knowledge. It’s a reminder of the idea that we don’t “know” a path into freedom or meaning so much as we “dwell” our way into it.
I am so grateful for your voice here, and for the whole constellation of thought you’re helping illuminate.
A fascinating piece and very well timed. At my retreat this week, we were learning about how to realize & manifest non-duality and someone asked Swami Sarvapriyananda about free will v. determinism in the context of ethical practices. Basically, if Vedanta says there's ultimately no free will, why do we need to care about ethics? He broke it down thusly:
(1) We certainly feel as though we have free will and the functioning of our society is based on that assumption.
(2) Even though it feels like we have free will, there's a lot of science, religion, etc that tells us about cause and effect, and that psychology shows that there are changes in the brain *before* a decision is made. Or as Vedanta would say, it's all existence-consciousness-bliss at the end of the day, and there's no actual "us" to do the doing.
So how do we square these?
(3) Regardless of whether we actually decide something or merely appear to decide, from an ethical perspective we should act as if we have free will but with the attitude of surrendering to God's will.
I actually found this to be helpful. As you lay out, determinism without a base layer of spirituality/surrender is far too depressing otherwise -- we might as well just sit on the couch and bingewatch Love Island
“…we should act as if we have free will but with the attitude of surrendering…” — I love that framing! Yes! Holding that paradox.
Whether we can ever “know” the certainty of it, we have to admit that we “feel” something like free will. And that felt sense means something. But to possess it as something we “own” … that it’s “my agency” might be the trap that we too often fall into. Strangely enough, to relinquish that clinging of “mine” might be what unlocks it.
Precisely!!! We have to immerse ourselves in the paradox.