Another reason why philosophers are useless

[Peter_Plato]

However if a skeptic points out zillions of prayers; none of which was fulfilled, that does not qualify as evidence against God."

Except that the skeptic doesn’t point to zillions of prayers that actually went unfulfilled. What the skeptic points to is his entrenched belief that a zillion prayers must have gone unfulfilled. That does not fit the parameters of the SM, either.

You still have failed to address my points about the failings of prayer experiments in general to properly assess the positive outcomes of prayer requests.

 

[tonyrey]

Those who stake everything on empirical knowledge are obviously unaware that the truth is not detectable by the senses because it is the intangible correspondence between thought and reality. So they either have to deny truth exists - which destroys the criterion of all their conclusions - or admit knowledge is not restricted to science - which raises the question of what non-scientific knowledge consists of…

And they’re too sharp to be evaded - although I’m pretty sure they’ll be ignored.

 

[Innoruk]

Except that the skeptic doesn’t point to zillions of prayers that actually went unfulfilled. What the skeptic points to is his entrenched belief that a zillion prayers must have gone unfulfilled.

Wow. According to the believer, if a prayer SEEMS to have worked, and produced a miracle, then it was successful. And the success is measured according to the supplicant’s desire.

Obviously the same criterion must be used for the unsuccessful prayers.

The fact that zillions of prayers are unfulfilled according to the ONLY criterion (which is the supplicant’s desire) is a FACT. On the other hand the fulfillment of a prayer cannot be counted as a fact, since there is no way to ascertain that the prayer actually played any part in the successful outcome.

Sheesh!

You still have failed to address my points about the failings of prayer experiments in general to properly assess the positive outcomes of prayer requests.

Do you also cheat in a game? Do you try to introduce a different criterion for your win and a different one for the opponent’s win? Looks like you want to play “If it is heads, you win, if it’s tails, the opponent loses” type of game?

Sorry, I only play with honest people, not cheaters.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Wow. According to the believer, if a prayer SEEMS to have worked, and produced a miracle, then it was successful. And the success is measured according to the supplicant’s desire.

Obviously the same criterion must be used for the unsuccessful prayers.

The fact that zillions of prayers are unfulfilled according to the ONLY criterion (which is the supplicant’s desire) is a FACT. On the other hand the fulfillment of a prayer cannot be counted as a fact, since there is no way to ascertain that the prayer actually played any part in the successful outcome.

Sheesh!

Fine, if you want to take this as evidence against a cosmic genie who answers every bidding, then go for it. However, what YOU were claiming is that this evidence counts against the existence of God. You seem to be the one “cheating” since you are using the criterion which would dispel the notion of a cosmic genie against the existence of a supreme moral intelligence.

See my post #133 and post #138, which you did not address, except superficially.

Do you also cheat in a game? Do you try to introduce a different criterion for your win and a different one for the opponent’s win? Looks like you want to play “If it is heads, you win, if it’s tails, the opponent loses” type of game?

Sorry, I only play with honest people, not cheaters.

It is not clear which game is being played because you want to use the simple-minded rules of Genie Detective to play the much more subtle and intricate game called Does God Exist?

 

[Peter_Plato]

Wow. According to the believer, if a prayer SEEMS to have worked, and produced a miracle, then it was successful. And the success is measured according to the supplicant’s desire.

Obviously the same criterion must be used for the unsuccessful prayers.

Let’s address this point, shall we.

The “believer” in your example above is not using the success of prayer to establish the existence of God, but to claim some kind of supernatural intervention by God. If you wish to apply this symmetrically to unanswered prayers, then the most you could insist is that the lack of success of many supplications works against the notion of supernatural intervention as a response to prayer by God. That is another way of saying God is not a genie that answers every request in exactly the way it was made to him. I already said I am fine with dispelling that notion.

It is you who wishes to transcribe this evidence (or lack of) as a claim against the existence of God. That would be an invalid step because the “believer” was not making a claim that the consistency of supernatural intervention in response to prayer is proof that God, therefore, exists, but merely that he intervenes supernaturally in some “expected” way.

The most you have shown is that God does not intervene as expected by human supplicants. I am fine with that claim, as well. The rules for playing Genie Detective remain undiminished.

 

[inocente]

However, I wish to point out that - in principle - God is subject to the scientific verification, since at least part of his activity happens in the physical reality. To say that there is an aspect of physical reality, which is NOT subject to the scientific method - would lead to all sorts of real troubles.

Not really. Sure, it goes a long way to disproving the kinds of deity which supposedly tinker around and interfere with the world, since there is no evidence for any of them.

But the God of tradition is everywhere and every-when. Since there is nowhere God is absent, no scientific test for His presence or absence is possible.

Trying to turn God into a scientific hypothesis is an especially popular past-time in America, but it’s got nothing to do with why most people believe.

 

[polytropos]

The fallacy what Aquinas commits here is called the “black swan” fallacy. It is (again) an unsubstantiated generalization from the peculiar to the whole. Not to mention that the understanding of Aquinas pertaining to the nature of “motion” or “change” is hopelessly incorrect. Motion, change are inherent properties of the space-time-matter-energy - none of which can be either created nor destroyed. There is no need to assume anything “external”. Obviously, Aquinas should not be blamed for his ignorance - he could not have known any better. His followers, however…!

It is not the black swan fallacy. I probably should not have included the world “all” because the second premise is actually not inductive. It is the definition of change which we learn from the world but cannot be coherently denied. All matter is something (say, a piece of firewood), but that firewood has various potentials (say, to be on fire). Those potentials are not actual. Something else in act (say, a match) can cause a change (a bringing of a potential into act) in the log.

This is learned from observation of the natural world, but it is not merely an inductive premise. To deny it would be to deny that it is impossible that something can come from nothing (that a potential can be actualized without a cause), which is incoherent. If we were to adopt such a position we would have to give up, among other thing, our commitment to modern science.

Your other misunderstanding is that we are not talking about the creation or destruction of matter, just the actualization of potentials latent in objects by something else in act. As such, the discussion of matter/energy and Aquinas’s understandable ignorance of modern science is a red herring. Aquinas’s proofs do not actually rely on God’s creation of matter distant in the past.

If you’d like to argue that change is not something becoming what it had the potential to be and that it is coherent to say that changes can occur without a cause, then please attempt to do so.

 

[Innoruk]

Not really. Sure, it goes a long way to disproving the kinds of deity which supposedly tinker around and interfere with the world, since there is no evidence for any of them.

But the God of tradition is everywhere and every-when. Since there is nowhere God is absent, no scientific test for His presence or absence is possible.

That is only one possible concept of God, among many others. (Please don’t assume that all the believers subscribe to this concept.) I might agree with this line of thought, IF people would not assert that God actually “tinkers” with our reality (miracles and such). They love to assert that the “once-in-a-blue-moon miracles” are positive “proofs” or evidence for the existence of God. At the same time they deny that the overwhelming lack of evidence expressed in the zillions of non-fulfilled supplications counts as a negative evidence.

There is a true saying: “the absence of proof is not a proof of absence”. However, the “absence of evidence is an overwhelming evidence of absence”.

 

[Innoruk]

It is not the black swan fallacy. I probably should not have included the world “all” because the second premise is actually not inductive.

Of course it is. The assertion is that there cannot be any motion or change (and these are NOT the same) unless there is an EXTERNAL causative agent present. That is the crux of the argument, which is supposed to point to some “god”.

It is the definition of change which we learn from the world but cannot be coherently denied. All matter is something (say, a piece of firewood), but that firewood has various potentials (say, to be on fire). Those potentials are not actual. Something else in act (say, a match) can cause a change (a bringing of a potential into act) in the log.

You (Aquinas) use a discarded model of “change” / “motion”, which is akin to a cue-stick pushing a billiard ball. There are radioactive atoms, which are inherently unstable, and will “change” without an external “causative agent”. Or to say that the Brownian motion of electrons requires an external “pusher-god” to make them vibrate.

To deny it would be to deny that it is impossible that something can come from nothing (that a potential can be actualized without a cause), which is incoherent. If we were to adopt such a position we would have to give up, among other thing, our commitment to modern science.

No, you would not have to abandon anything. All we need is a realization that our usual understanding may need revision. Just like the emergence of “virtual particles”, which was considered “impossible” before.

If you’d like to argue that change is not something becoming what it had the potential to be and that it is coherent to say that changes can occur without a cause, then please attempt to do so.

You (or Aquinas) need to show that there needs to be an EXTERNAL causative agent. Good luck with that.

 

[Innoruk]

Or to say that the Brownian motion of electrons requires an external “pusher-god” to make them vibrate.

Oops, typo. It was supposed to say: “the Brownian motion of molecules”. Sorry 'bout that.

 

[jonathan_hili]

Pertaining to the physical reality I use the so-called scientific - inductive - method. Pertaining to the axiomatic aspect of reality, I use the deductive method. As for the “non-physical reality”, I keep ASKING about their objective, repeatable epistemological method, but I don’t get a reply.

Okay, but don’t you need a philosophy to justify induction? Furthermore, how do you escape Hume’s criticism of causation and scepticism in general?

With regards the deductive method (and, I guess, inductive one), doesn’t it require a metaphysic that substantiates the validity of such a method? Why even trust our logic can translate to the real world since it is essentially a self-referential language?

What do you mean by “non-physical reality”? Mathematics, logic and morality are all aspects of “non-physical reality”.

I use the simplest possible method: “The proof of the pudding is that it is edible”.

Sure. So you also rely on a philosophical perspective. Why, then, say that philosophy is useless? I mean, in the face of scepticism, it takes good philosophy to justify your approach.

 

[Innoruk]

Okay, but don’t you need a philosophy to justify induction?

No, I don’t. Look at all the animals, who use a very simple form of induction. They see (or hear, or smell) an enemy, they flee if they can - to preserve their existence. They encounter a food which they ate before, and they “bet” their life that the food will be edible again. Inductive “epistemology” in an instinctual form.

As a matter of fact, rats are extremely observant, and that is why they will avoid food tainted with fast actions poisons. They see other rats tasting something, they see their death soon thereafter, and they “hypothesize” that the “food” is not good for them. Since they do not have a long-term memory, people use slow-acting poisons (blood-thinners) against them.

Those rats do not have a sophisticated “epistemology”, but they sure survive.

Furthermore, how do you escape Hume’s criticism of causation and scepticism in general?

I don’t. If a method works, it does not need external justification. (This is what the proof of the pudding is all about.)

With regards the deductive method (and, I guess, inductive one), doesn’t it require a metaphysic that substantiates the validity of such a method? Why even trust our logic can translate to the real world since it is essentially a self-referential language?

In a deductive system we define that a proposition is true, if it can be reached from the axioms. Again, this method “works”.

What do you mean by “non-physical reality”? Mathematics, logic and morality are all aspects of “non-physical reality”.

No, did not mean that. Mathematics and logic are part of the axiomatic (deductive) sciences, while morality is simply a set of rules of socially acceptable behavior. By the term of “non-physical reality” I mean the alleged existence of gods, angels, demons, and the like. These are alleged entities, which are not material in nature, yet can influence the physical reality, and they can be influenced by our physical reality (prayers, exorcisms, etc). I ask to see an objective, repeatable epistemological method which will enable the skeptic to decide whether propositions concerning this “hypothesized reality” are true or not.

Not just “big” ones, like is there some deity or not, but also small ones, like “how many angels can stand on the tip of a needle”? Or how do “guardian angels operate”? Things like these.

Sure. So you also rely on a philosophical perspective. Why, then, say that philosophy is useless? I mean, in the face of scepticism, it takes good philosophy to justify your approach.

Why would it? It requires no philosophical underpinning for the rats to flee from a predator, or to avoid fact acting drugs. Again, the “proof of the pudding” is the simple way to show that our survival is the litmus-test: “if we made a proper assessment of the external reality, we survive”. Look at that horrible accident in Spain here… where the driver made an incorrect assumption. An example of incorrect induction.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Of course it is. The assertion is that there cannot be any motion or change (and these are NOT the same) unless there is an EXTERNAL causative agent present. That is the crux of the argument, which is supposed to point to some “god”.

This is based upon a misunderstanding of Aquinas. For the sake of argument, his working definition of motion was in terms of a broad Aristotelian concept of change in general and not limited to mere movement. This has to do with his metaphysics relating to potency and act. That change is the result of activating various potentials of existing entities. (In Meta IX, 1, 1770)

It is also a mistaken view of Aquinas to claim all causative agency had to be for him external to the entity in question. That was not his claim at all. For Aquinas, all change is to be understood in terms of potency and act. Physical objects are a composition of potency and act. What they are is definable not just in terms of their actual properties but also in terms of their potential. There is within each entity potential to change which must be actualized by something already in act. What does the actualizing need not be “external” to the entity. It only needs to be actual in order to cause change.

Aquinas also distinguished between change “per accidens” and “per se” or “essential” change. Where change is per accidens, the effect carries within itself the power to be a new agent of change. Subsequent change is not dependent upon the original cause remaining present. Reproduction would be an example of this. Each new generation of living beings carries within itself the power to generate new individuals that are essentially the same, but exhibit the accidental differences of appearance. However, that power to actualize or generate new individuals, in itself, would need to be traceable to an original cause which did not originate in the first member of the species, but in some other cause that actualized the first member. That power had to be external, because it cannot be explained by anything about the agent itself, whether the first or any subsequent agents in the causal chain.

The second type of change, per se, or essential change, requires the immediate action of the cause to bring about the change. A hand lifting a glass is an example of this. The motion of the glass is, in a sense, indistinguishable from the motion of the hand. Music being played by a musician is another example. For Aquinas, the universe itself is an example, like music arising from the instrument of a musician playing it, of an effect arising from the creative action of God.

You (Aquinas) use a discarded model of “change” / “motion”, which is akin to a cue-stick pushing a billiard ball. There are radioactive atoms, which are inherently unstable, and will “change” without an external “causative agent”. Or to say that the Brownian motion of electrons requires an external “pusher-god” to make them vibrate.

Your analysis here is mistaken. Aquinas does not use a discarded model of change, but argues instead that motion is not always like the cue stick pushing a billiard ball, but rather that whatever change occurs requires an explanation, either within the entity itself, if the change is per accidens or ultimately outside the agent if the change is an essential one. The problem with pointing to a “per accidens” change and claiming the change is explained by the object’s own functioning (a dog wagging its tail) is that we have not explained where the power itself came from. What was the cause of that power? Accidental change requires some form of essential change agent that must be explained.

Brownian motion may not require an external “pusher” but it does require an external explanation for its capacity to create vibration, just as the reproductive capacity of living organisms explains how new organisms arise, but that does not explain where the reproductive capacity itself came from.

No, you would not have to abandon anything. All we need is a realization that our usual understanding may need revision. Just like the emergence of “virtual particles”, which was considered “impossible” before.

You (or Aquinas) need to show that there needs to be an EXTERNAL causative agent. Good luck with that.

Aquinas does not need to show that causative agents need to be external. He admits that causative agency can be internal where the change is “per accidens.” However, he insists that causative agency, where it cannot be fully explained by the internal structure of the agent, must require an explanation outside of itself, as per the principle of sufficient reason.

In other words, where the causal explanation is insufficient then we must move to find a sufficient explanation. Science lives by this same principle. It would not be sufficient to accept Brownian motion as a given, but rather we must ask why such a capacity is even possible. To answer that question requires that, at some point, the answer is to be found in whatever actualizes the capacity itself.

Aquinas’ argument “from motion” is that ultimately, to satisfy the principle of sufficient reason, we must arrive at a cause that explains itself as well as everything that comes from it. Without that explanation, we are left with an endless series of inherently unexplained effects.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

They are unable to come up with a coherent definition of “free will”.

Definition #1:
Some will assert that in order to have free will, one needs the following:

1. at least two different courses of action - where both of them would lead to a desired (willed) outcome for the agent
2. the locus of decision (which one to choose) must be with the agent
3. the agent can execute either action

Definition #2:
Others dispute this. They say that it is enough to be able to “will, wish, desire” to execute a certain action, but it is not necessary that one should be free to actually carry out that action. These people wish to separate “free will” and “freedom of action”. In their opinion the internal freedom of “wishing to do something” is a sufficient criterion of “free will”.

What is your opinion? I suggest to give an example why you prefer definition #1 or definition #2 (as the case may be).

Most members state what they are : atheist, agnostic, Baptist, Hindu, Catholic, Catholic - revert, etc. You choose to toy with the religious designation. Too clever by half. But actually, no Catholic, still seriously wishing to be identified as Catholic, could possibily hold the views you hold; in fact, no Christian of any sort could possibily hold your views. So why don’t you revise the affiliation portion of your history. We really don’t mind.

Nevertheless, Today’s Gospel, Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Luke 11: 1-13

Luke 11: 1 - 13​

1 He was praying in a certain place, and when he ceased, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”
2 And he said to them, "When you pray, say: “Father, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come.
3 Give us each day our daily bread;
4 and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive every one who is indebted to us; and lead us not into temptation.”
5 And he said to them, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, Friend, lend me three loaves; 6 for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him'; 7 and he will answer from within, Do not bother me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything’?
8 I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him whatever he needs.
9 And I tell you, Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.
10 For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.
11 What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent;
12 or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?
13 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

---

Now, you can parse that any way you wish. God does answer prayers. But He is more likely to do so if we are trying to co-operate with Him.

Linus2nd

 

[polytropos]

EDIT: Did not see Peter Plato’s response. But here are my thoughts anyway.

Of course it is. The assertion is that there cannot be any motion or change (and these are NOT the same) unless there is an EXTERNAL causative agent present. That is the crux of the argument, which is supposed to point to some “god”.

You (Aquinas) use a discarded model of “change” / “motion”, which is akin to a cue-stick pushing a billiard ball. There are radioactive atoms, which are inherently unstable, and will “change” without an external “causative agent”. Or to say that the Brownian motion of electrons requires an external “pusher-god” to make them vibrate.

That is not exactly the claim.

First of all, in Aristotelian metaphysics, the language of which Thomas used because it was the default philosophy of the time, motion meant what we now mean by change. I would completely agree that motion in Newtonian and relativistic physics refers to a completely separate phenomenon. But it is simply false to say that motion, as it is understood in the Thomistic sense, is not change. Furthermore, change is a transformation from potency to act by something else in act. No matter how you look at change, that is what it is. Contradicting that statement is incoherent.

Second of all, the word “external” is yours - not mine, and not Thomas’s. It is not exactly wrong, although the way you are using it is distorting the argument. My hand is actually open but has a potential to be closed. When I close my hand (a move from potency to act), that is a change. There is not (at least not obviously) a cause of that external to me, so is it therefore coherent to say that the closing of my hand was uncaused? Of course not, that would either be a misrepresentation or misunderstanding of the problem. The muscles in my hand contracted because certain ions were released into my muscle cells. Those ions were released into my muscle cells because an action potential reached them by way of axons. (And so on.) So in a sense the cause of each change is external to the entity undergoing change, but what on the macroscopic level looks like internally generated change is on a more microscopic level external change.

This is one of the two issues with the example of radioactive atoms. They are not acted on by something external to them, but that’s not what the proof requires. The radiation does not have to be caused by something external to the atom because the atom is made up of other entities which have potentialities and actualities inherent in them, in the same way that there is not a cause for the closing of my hand external to me, but there are causes within the relevant parts of my anatomy which are always external to what is actually being changed. If your observation is fixated on a certain scale of observation (whether it is a human individual or a single atom), you have committed an error and should not expect to get the correct result. The fact that something appears uncaused at one level does not imply that it is actually uncaused. It is, again, incoherent to suppose that a potentiality comes into act without being acted upon.

The related issue is the confusion between indeterminacy and a lack of causality. Radiation is indeterminate (as far as we can tell), but it is simply a non-sequitur to claim that it is therefore uncaused. The first reason is that, strictly speaking, indeterminate events are not uncaused. The second reason is that our understanding of radiation is an empirical model, not a complete reality of what actually happens to a particle. Darwin knew that differences in phenotype lead to differential reproductive success, but did not know anything about the mechanisms of heritability of genes, alleles, etc. Gregor Mendel discovered more about those mechanisms, but still didn’t know about DNA and many of the specifics of heritability, though his model pierced through to a deeper level than Darwin’s. Neither of them could have coherently claimed that differences in phenotype were uncaused and “just happened,” even though they did not have a full explanation of them. Part of the reason is that it would be presumptuous. The other reason is that it is flatly incoherent to maintain that a potentiality can come into actuality by anything other than something else in act, regardless of how committed someone is to disputing the premise.

Likewise, it does not follow from your examples that any change can occur without a cause. Radiation is a consequence of the particular structure of certain isotopes. Probabilistic models ignore the particulars because they are too small to observe and because what is usually important is the rate at which a given sample of an element is decaying. There is nothing in the theory that suggests that radiation occurs without a cause.

What is outdated in this discussion is not Aristotle’s notion of change, but the idea that atoms are just bunches of neutrons and protons that suddenly send off a radiation particle without a cause.

 

[Peter_Plato]

No, I don’t. Look at all the animals, who use a very simple form of induction. They see (or hear, or smell) an enemy, they flee if they can - to preserve their existence. They encounter a food which they ate before, and they “bet” their life that the food will be edible again. Inductive “epistemology” in an instinctual form.

I don’t. If a method works, it does not need external justification. (This is what the proof of the pudding is all about.)

This seems to me an example of the black swan fallacy.

Every swan I have ever seen is black.
Everything I know comes from inductive reasoning.

What about this white swan?
**What about axioms, intuitions, mathematical proofs, principles of logic, etc.?
**
It’s not black, therefore not a swan.
If it’s not evidential, it cannot be known without inductive proof.

How do you know that swans must be black? Because they always are. This requires no external justification. The proof is in the “pudding” that swans are always black.
How do you know reasoning must be inductive? Because it always is, it requires no external justification, just "proof in the pudding."

 

[inocente]

That is fine. However, I wish to point out that - in principle - God is subject to the scientific verification
inocente;11031464:

Not really. Sure, it goes a long way to disproving the kinds of deity which supposedly tinker around and interfere with the world, since there is no evidence for any of them.

But the God of tradition is everywhere and every-when. Since there is nowhere God is absent, no scientific test for His presence or absence is possible.
Innoruk;11032177:

That is only one possible concept of God, among many others. (Please don’t assume that all the believers subscribe to this concept.)

Hang on, in your first post above you assumed all believers subscribe to one concept of God, then when I point out they don’t you tell me not to make your assumption.

I might agree with this line of thought, IF people would not assert that God actually “tinkers” with our reality (miracles and such). They love to assert that the “once-in-a-blue-moon miracles” are positive “proofs” or evidence for the existence of God. At the same time they deny that the overwhelming lack of evidence expressed in the zillions of non-fulfilled supplications counts as a negative evidence.

There is a true saying: “the absence of proof is not a proof of absence”. However, the “absence of evidence is an overwhelming evidence of absence”.

So perhaps we’re agreed that if believers don’t all subscribe to a single concept of God, it’s not valid to lump all believers together, whatever they believe, and write off all of them if one disagrees with any of them.

Re. the OP:

Surely the important thing about the concept of free-will is the sense of freedom we all have in our thoughts, in each of us having a unique identity as an individual, in our competence to find our own way, to have self-determination. That’s an ideal people are willing to lay down their lives to protect.

Whereas (forgive me) your OP questions are just the kind of imponderables ordinary people find pointless but which the more useless of philosophers spend their entire lives squabbling about.

 

[Innoruk]

That is not exactly the claim.

First of all, in Aristotelian metaphysics, the language of which Thomas used because it was the default philosophy of the time, motion meant what we now mean by change.

No real difference. Some changes are due to external factors, others are inherent to the object in question. To lead to some “external deity” one would need to argue that all changes are due to some external agent.

 

[Innoruk]

Everything I know comes from inductive reasoning.

That is your personal problem. Get over it. Others do not share your view.

 

[Innoruk]

So perhaps we’re agreed that if believers don’t all subscribe to a single concept of God, it’s not valid to lump all believers together, whatever they believe, and write off all of them if one disagrees with any of them.

Absolutely.

Whereas (forgive me) your OP questions are just the kind of imponderables ordinary people find pointless but which the more useless of philosophers spend their entire lives squabbling about.

Well said! One reason to think about such questions is a stimulating mental exercise. Another one would be the pondering of the “free will” defense for the problem of evil.