Taboo Topics (Heavily moderated)

[YCobb]

An omniscient being does not require observation. They do not need it. They could be blind, deaf, and dumb, but still know everything. It's not observation, it's just knowledge.

Uh, yeah. There are all things I've already said.
I think you're misunderstanding the scope of 'observation' and its meaning in this context. If it is known or acknowledged or in any way recognized, it is observed.

Observation is experiencing an event through human senses, so, no, having knowledge of something before experiencing it is not observation.

You're doing that thing where you make up your own specifications for a word's definition again.

[Kamak]

The common definition of observation is:

an act or instance of noticing or perceiving

To perceive is to:

Verb
Become aware or conscious of (something); come to realize or understand.
Become aware of (something) by the use of one of the senses, esp. that of sight.

In total omniscience, there is no need to become aware of knowledge. If that were the case, God wouldn't be omniscient. In that case, God does not perceive or observe the universe as we would expect him to. That's assigning human-like characteristics to an entity that is non-human in the hopes of some universality or a manner of hubris.

[YCobb]

In philosohical matters, I propose a broader definition. That definition is too literal to really matter in terms of the argument I'm making - there's no other word that conveys the fact that an omniscient deity would in some way go about being aware.
There's simply no other word in the English language that addresses the problems such cognizance would pose for the concept of free will.

[Galaxy Man]

That would be because, as previously stated, the idea that it would affect free will is complete bullshit and makes no sense.
Omniscience means, by it's very definition, that you do not need to observe to know. An omniscient being, by definition, would not need to observe. They would not need to experience an event.

Lets imagine, just for a second, that there is an omniscient being who looks, acts, and otherwise is human. They have human blood, bones, skin, and by any test would be human, but they happen to have omniscience. Lets place that person in completely empty space, bodaciously as far away from Earth as possible, an infinite distance away.

They would have no ability to experience events on Earth. They could not observe events. It could not happen through any means whatsoever.
But, they're omniscient. They already know what is going to happen.

This is not observation. This is not watching and experiencing events. This is having knowledge of events.

And something to very seriously note is that even if they were observing life, actually living on Earth, it would change nothing. There would still be things it could not observe. Like I said, there is no wave function that remains uncollapsed until someone realizes an events happened, because that's not how any part of reality works.

If you're under the assumption, for whatever reason, that you can change events by seeing something that happened, as if it might not have had you not, you're just feeding your ego. It's a false statement, and a false idea of how the universe works. Knowing something, being aware of events, does not change those events, does not suddenly lock them into one possible outcome.

Omniscience, as I've said a hundred thousand billion times, would never in a single billionth of a billionth of a second actually alter the universe by just having the knowledge.

Could an omniscient being change the universe? Yeah, actually, probably. Knowing everything and all things means you could affect events before they happen, that you could probably play with reality like a child with playdough. Omniscience might even be enough of a vast scale of knowledge that an omniscient being might just become omnipotent as a side effect. But just the knowledge? The fact that they would know everything wouldn't change a daisies thing.

[Doormaster]

You are technically correct. The existence of an omnicient being does not, in itself, change anything

What my, and I believe YCobb's, point is that the existence of such a being is inextricably linked to the nonexistence of free will

Smoke doesn't cause fire, but you'll pretty much always see them together. Similarly, omniscience doesn't directly cause free will to be impossible, but you can't have the first without the second.

[Galaxy Man]

Except if we live in a universe where there are multiple different timelines for every possible event that branch out forever.

Because in that situation we do have choices and the ability to change our lives even if someone can see every timeline, because while they can see every timeline and can see every event, they're watching them all happen at the same time.

To us, however, we can only see the timeline that we're in, and what matters to us is the timeline that we are in. We make choices based on that, we live based on where we are, and we do have a choice even if someone knows all possible choices. If there is more than once choice, they have no idea which one you will pick and could never know, because technically, from a point outside of time, you picked all of them.

[Doormaster]

That's still not a "choice". That's just you happening to experience a universe where you are a part of a very particular set of occurrences.

Also, why on earth would we assume that we live in such a weird, convoluted place?

[Galaxy Man]

You've never heard of the idea of alternate universes? The idea that for every action and reaction, there is a universe where that action did not happen? It's a pretty basic idea.

It's not something I'm assuming either. It is, right out, one of the possible options. The other would be that we're in one timeline that is fixed, and if that's the case, then there's bodaciously no such thing as choice, just what you happen to experience as a pre-set conditioned thing.

Alternatively, if the timeline does experience splits, then we do have choice, because bodaciously anything we can do creates a new timeline. However, the amount of things we can do is fixed by reality and our previous choices, it's a finite amount technically. It's just there's such an overwhelmingly large amount it couldn't be counted by anyone.

[Doormaster]

I've heard of alternate universes, I just think they're a little ridiculous and make things needlessly complicated.

But let's assume for a while that it's actually true

Before we continue, in the way you're describing the alternate universes, does God know all past and future choices/timelines, or does he only know the past/present ones as the number of universes grows exponentially as different choices are made?

[Galaxy Man]

I've heard of alternate universes, I just think they're a little ridiculous and make things needlessly complicated.

Generally, as a rule, the universe is complicated.

So ignoring a very valid concept because it's complicated sort of sounds like you're not entirely clear on that.

But let's assume for a while that it's actually true

Before we continue, in the way you're describing the alternate universes, does God know all past and future choices/timelines, or does he only know the past/present ones as the number of universes grows exponentially as different choices are made?

That would depend on your definition of omniscience.

I mentioned before true and inherent omniscience. True omniscience is knowing everything always no matter what. Inherent omniscience would be more controlled, a being who is inherently omniscient could purposefully limit their own knowledge of events.
In fact, some people believe a christian god to be inherently omniscient, not totally. A god limiting their own knowledge to allow for free will (we have gone over why this is false).

Because inherent omniscience is kind of weird and would rely on us knowing exactly what knowledge is being held back and isn't even a problem, I've been assuming it's been true omniscience. So it would be knowledge of all events, past, future, present, across the entire infinite span of possibilities.

I've also not really been arguing that it's God, so much as any omniscient being. Though, to be fair, once you know everything ever and always, you've already met the qualifiers for godhood.

[Kamak]

Yes, to be truly Omniscient, God would have to know everything that was, is, and would be in the universe, meaning they'd have inherent knowledge of every alternate universe.

And in addition, if we assume there is a truly infinite number of alternate universes, eventually we will stumble upon an alternate timeline where every decision, every sub-atomic particle, everything in that universe, behaved the same way as our timeline. Now, there will be a lot of timelines that are very similar to ours but not exactly like them because of events that changed the timeline maybe on another planet, but assuming we can find an exact copy of our timeline out there, it's still possible for free will to exist in the universe, as there isn't just a rigid "yes/no/third option" splitting going on where you had no choice because the yous in the other timelines chose the other options).

To make it simple, assuming there's only one timeline for each decision, each of the yous would have to make different choices. If the other me's chose Charmander and Squirtle, I'd have to choose Bulbasaur.

But if there were multiple copies of the same exact timelines because of the infinite nature of timelines, thousands of my would be able to choose Bulbasaur, or Squirtle, or Charmander, and I'd be able to choose whichever one I felt like.

It's a lot more freeing because my decision does not impact the fact that there are others who can fill the niche I refused to fill.

[Galaxy Man]

The thing to remember is that bodaciously anything would split the timeline. In another, almost infinite number of timelines, you always picked Charmander. But, somewhere else in the infinite expansive reality, something else happened as tiny as one particle moving an almost impossible to measure way.

I'm calling it alternate universe, or alternate timelines, to be more clear. However, in reality, this would all still be one timeline. We see time from a different standpoint, a linear thing. Time is a subjective matter, and can be seen in ways we would find impossible to comprehend. An omniscient being wouldn't see time like us. It would see time in a way we could never in our lives be able to comprehend or even imagine, because they'd have every possible point of view on time at once.

[Kamak]

The thing to remember is that bodaciously anything would split the timeline. In another, almost infinite number of timelines, you always picked Charmander. But, somewhere else in the infinite expansive reality, something else happened as tiny as one particle moving an almost impossible to measure way.

Yes, but at the same time, if there is a truly infinite number of timelines, eventually you'll be able to come across a repeat of a single stream of time (from the beginning of the universe to infinite time) that matches it exactly, down to the movements of sub-atomic particles.

It's the same principle of thinking where if the universe is infinite, there's an infinite amount of Earths with the same exact past, present, and future to ours, you just might have to travel an astronomically long distance to reach it.

[Galaxy Man]

The thing to remember is that bodaciously anything would split the timeline. In another, almost infinite number of timelines, you always picked Charmander. But, somewhere else in the infinite expansive reality, something else happened as tiny as one particle moving an almost impossible to measure way.

Yes, but at the same time, if there is a truly infinite number of timelines, eventually you'll be able to come across a repeat of a single stream of time (from the beginning of the universe to infinite time) that matches it exactly, down to the movements of sub-atomic particles.

It's the same principle of thinking where if the universe is infinite, there's an infinite amount of Earths with the same exact past, present, and future to ours, you just might have to travel an astronomically long distance to reach it.

But... no?

This is a really confusing thing I'm saying so lets break this down a little bit.

The idea that a timeline branches out, and has multiple timelines starting from a single point, is what is often called "alternate timelines" or "alternate universes" that are comprised of any and every possible changes to ever exist in any point in time. The amount of possible changes is infinite, but not the amount of changes at every point that branches out.

There is a finite amount of timeline branches for every point in time, but each branch has it's own finite amount of branches. So, yes, the amount of branches is infinite, because there will always be more. However, there cannot be repeats, because it all started from a single point when time began. Each branch is, by it's very nature, different from all the other infinite branches.

In a universe that is truly infinite, then yes there is a chance of repeating things. But a branching timeline is an infinite amount of finite things, which cannot repeat because every timeline would be by definition different, even in some way that is so minuscule it changed nothing else.

Now, if there is an infinite number of entirely unconnected timelines that have their own, individual beginnings, yes there would be repeats. But not otherwise.

[YCobb]

Please stop treating Homestuck as scientific fact

What Chinmaster and I are saying is that if anyone knows what's going to happen, then that's what going to happen and no amount of decision making can change that unless they're wrong. (ie not omniscient)
And what you're saying is that there might be alternate timelines. If this is true, then there are two options.
The first option is that there is some guy who knows what might happen. This is not omniscience.
The second option is that in each timeline there is a separate version of the hypothetical omniscient being who knows what will happen in that specific timeline. There are two issues with this - first of all, free will is still impossible in any given timeline. The second problem is that this effectively negates the relevance of alternate timelines.



Also, uh, this has stopped being a taboo topic.

Edit: also what on earth are you talking about with "finite branches" and shit
Do you realize we live in an analogue universe governed on a minute scale by quantum phenomena, ie the only truly random variables known to exist? That whole "finite" bit is absurd to state as fact.