More thoughts on causality

Yes, this is actually the kind of drek that I think about on my lunch break. Let the beating commence.

I stumbled across this in an anthology of Aristotle:

Therefore nothing either is or happens by chance or as chance has it; nor will it be nor not be thus. Rather, everything happens from necessity and not as chance has it, since either the affirmer or the denier speaks truly. For otherwise, it might equally well happen or not happen; for what happens as chance has it neither is nor will be any more this way than that.

Further, if something is pale now, it was true to say previously that it would be pale, so that it was always true to say of any thing that has happened that it would be. But if it was always true to say that it was or would be, it could not not be, or not be going to be. But if something cannot not happen, it is impossible for it not to happen; and what cannot not happen necessarily happens. Everything, then, that will be will be necessarily. Therefore, nothing will be as chance has it or by chance; for if it is by chance it is not from necessity. 

It appears that Aristotle is making an argument here which then he goes on to refute, namely that nothing  happens by chance. His reason for refuting "fate" is the (to him) self-evident fact that until an event has occurred, any number of variables may work to derive numerous possible outcomes:

For we see that both deliberation and action originate things that will be; and, in general, we see in things that are not always in actuality that there is the possibility both of being and of not being; in these cases both being and not being, and hence both happening and not happening, are possible.

So when I opened my closet to decide what tie I was going to wear today, it was not necessary that I pick the paisley tie that I am currently wearing; as many ties as existed in my closet were available to me as potential options (not to mention I could have stopped at work to buy a new tie, stolen one, etc.). I had to put thought into the decision (about .00000000000234 nanoseconds, as it turned out). I had to consider if it would be appropriate for a meeting, how it would go with the suit I planned to wear, etc. Now, if 2000 years ago, someone had said "on March 14, 2013, Geoff White will wear a paisley tie to work," it would have been a factually true statement, and never not true from then until today. But it would not be necessarily true--rather it would be coincidentally true.

Aristotle seems to be hanging his straw man argument on the influence of the declarer to affect the outcome: "everything happens from necessity and not as chance has it, since either the affirmer or the denier speaks truly." Other philosophers have made more compelling arguments for fate-type causality (event x sparks event y sparks event z ...... sparks event z raised to thee 333,3333,333,333rd power which caused you to have oatmeal for breakfast this morning) but since Aristotle is setting up this argument just to tear it apart he doesn't devote a lot of time to exploring it. Of course future events aren't fixed merely by an individual declaring that they will be so.

Unless of course, the one making the statement has the power to cause the outcome to be. The first excerpt is an accurate depiction of reality if there is an all-powerful, all-knowing, ubiquitous-to-all-times-and-places God, who "works all things after the counsel of his will (Eph 1:11)", issuing the decree.