The Human Question

Here is an excerpt from an email I sent to David B., arguing that "event" determinism is opposed to rationality. Hello David: I will argue against your conclusion with a math argument requiring knowledge of only basic arithmetic. I argue that to deny that we have free will on the basis of physical determinism is to imply that we are not rational, i.e., that we are not capable of knowing universal and necessary truths as such. But such an implication undermines the very math and science David uses to establish the thesis that we are predetermined. Hence David, your argument, when brought to its conclusion, is self-defeating. Why? because if every event, including everything that we think is determined by a previous event, then it seems that our thinking that we really know that 2+2=4 is predetermined by previous event(s) as well. But if we are forced into thinking that the above equation (which is a stand-in for all claims to universal knowledge) is true, then it is also conce