Blame the Brain - Page 6

On May 21 2012 07:46 Jitsu wrote:
One of the many reasons I don't ever read the TL General forum anymore.
GG.

On May 20 2012 12:55 Ace.Xile wrote:
To your last point, yes and no. Punishment exists in at least a proper sense to elicit change, not necessarily be a source of retribution. Punishment doesn't require one to have free will because the goal of the punishment is to change deviant behavior period. Also with the lack of free will it doesn't mean you are not responsible for your actions. They are after all your actions, just because you didn't have a choice doesn't change the fact that you committed them and in the grander scheme it is entirely okay to punish someone so that they do not in the future make these actions. It's a very tricky line because you'd be hard pressed to find anyone sane say that because we don't have free will we can't be held responsible for our actions, but we should because they affect others and we can potentially change people's future actions with punishment.

On May 21 2012 07:47 Lord Gilgamesh wrote:




You know what, if you dont like it you have FREE WILL and if you dont contribute I will report you and you will get banned as you are off topic.

GG

On May 18 2012 23:29 Sea_Food wrote:
The people I say are evil, are evil.

People can be evil, good or stupid. No reason to know learn 100 000 000 different medical terms for different kinds of people and their mental states.

Dont listen to what others say.

On May 21 2012 08:10 Jitsu wrote:


I have my opinion on the topic, but since trying to have a legitimate debit ends up with people thinking other people are stupid/wrong automatically based on zero solid, physical evidence and only on their opinions, makes any debate here hard to even have.

I'm a Psychology major. I don't want to become a Psychologist. I also believe in Free Will, and I am a religious person.

Watch how many people are going to hate on me because of the above statement. It'll actually make it impossible to hold a debate because a lot of people will think i'm automatically wrong based on my beliefs.

Also, why are you playing the role of a backdoor mod?

On May 21 2012 04:11 Ace.Xile wrote:

Yeah but the argument is that at any given moment based upon environment you will make a certain choice because of forces acted upon you, your choices are out of your control based upon everything that's happened

On May 21 2012 08:10 Jitsu wrote:


I have my opinion on the topic, but since trying to have a legitimate debit ends up with people thinking other people are stupid/wrong automatically based on zero solid, physical evidence and only on their opinions, makes any debate here hard to even have.

I'm a Psychology major. I don't want to become a Psychologist. I also believe in Free Will, and I am a religious person.

Watch how many people are going to hate on me because of the above statement. It'll actually make it impossible to hold a debate because a lot of people will think i'm automatically wrong based on my beliefs.

Also, why are you playing the role of a backdoor mod?

On May 21 2012 08:50 DoubleReed wrote:


No, your choices are completely in your control. It's NOT that your consciousness is destined to pick this choice or that choice, it's that your entire consciousness is totally determined. You still have complete control over what you do and all choices you make. It's just that 'you' is determinable.

On May 21 2012 07:53 Kukaracha wrote:


Responsability only exists when a choice is consciously made by an individual who could've done otherwise. If there's no free will, then what happened was bound to happen. Responsability is not cause, otherwise we wouldn't have the principle of "legal responsability" for adults in contrast to minors.

Furthermore, does punishment change anything in the case I brought up? If I wasn't going to kill again anyway, then why should I change? And as said before, it rarely changes people for the better, it often just hardens individuals who happen to survive the jungle that prison is.
As for the idea that it's the removal of a dangerous individual from society, again, do you stop the flood with a glass of water? Not only is this removal temporary, but in many cases criminals are simply replaced by others on the outside.

So, even though the constitution only speaks of "rehabilitation" and "regulation", the main motive still seems to be retribution. This is why Norwegian prisons are an exception and a scandal in many eyes.

On May 21 2012 05:57 Sea_Food wrote:
Guys, i can proof that free will does exist.

If everything was AND is predetrminated by billions of tiny things (that top scientist have very loose speculations of what they are atm), and everything is just a chain reaction, then in the future someone could build this machine that sees the whole universe in the most precise detail. Now he could also build a machine that uses that information to calculate the already set and comfirmed future. Now the machine could tell the guy that he will either lift hes hands up after 5 seconds, or not lift them. Because the guy has FREE WILL, he can choose to not obey the pre set future.

I am glad you all understood what i ment.

On May 21 2012 09:26 Ace.Xile wrote:


This doesn't even make sense, it's like you try to divide a person is and what his decisions are which isn't the case. Who you are is a biological thing in all it's senses, all your choices are believe it or not the result of biological and chemical reactions that take place. Because of your brain wiring and how it works you will choose certain decisions. It's almost as if you assume that there is some other being separate as if there is a brain and then there is a self. Which if you want to choose to argue of something like that (the soul) that's fine, but to prove that one has a soul would take thousands of posts in this thread, if it were even possible. The self that makes choices is a direct representation of the biochemical reactions in the brain. To say that you have complete control over what you do, and at the same time that "you" are predetermined, doesn't make sense, they're contradicting ideas. What you do is the result of what you are.

Like i said you are more than willing to try to explain, i'm more than welcome to hear anything but it seems that you try to argue that our actions and choices are somehow not a direct result of who we are and the situation we are in, which most arguments would say otherwise. Our "conscious" is the result of neurochemical reactions.

On May 21 2012 09:55 DoubleReed wrote:


It doesn't seem contradictory to me. 'You' have complete control over what you do. However, 'you' are predetermined.

So yes your decisions are predetermined eventually, but you're still making them. When you're talking about people, the 'you' is referring to something, your consciousness. You can't argue that choices are 'out of your control.' No they aren't. Because the you is your consciousness which has control over the situation.

On May 21 2012 10:07 Ace.Xile wrote:


I mean that's fine you can argue that you are making the choices, the problem is that there is only one choice you will make at any given moment and what you will chose is out of your control because it is determined by your brains wiring and the given situation. I don't understand the the thought about the fact that you have control over the situation, the you is your consciousness again, which is the result of your brains wiring and the given situation. Like when it comes down to it, your brain wiring and given environment make decisions, you could argue that you can change the environment but you'd just be doing it in response to your previous situation milliseconds ago with your brain wiring.

On May 21 2012 07:46 Jitsu wrote:
One of the many reasons I don't ever read the TL General forum anymore.
GG.

On May 21 2012 09:33 Ace.Xile wrote:
Actually if you look at the definition of what it means to be responsible it only implies:

Being the primary cause of something and so able to be blamed or credited for it.

On May 21 2012 09:33 Ace.Xile wrote:
It does not imply that it was necessarily a choice it just relies on who can be blamed. If i kill someone whether it was my choice or not i can still be held responsible. In some cases people try to find mitigating factors but it doesn't change the fact that at the end of the day that I did it. It is the case that people feel that those who fall under mitigating circumstances are less responsible, but in the end it still doesn't change the fact that I would have been the one to kill someone. I feel like you're implying that if we don't have free will then one can not be held responsible, however that isn't correct. One can be like i mentioned previously and should because then you can apply methods to change their behavior. If someone who is declared medically insane kills someone, we don't let them off free, we attempt to rehabilitate them even though in some cases it is out of their control what they do. There is a distinct difference, or should be, between retribution and rehabilitation.

On May 21 2012 09:33 Ace.Xile wrote:
It seems also you think to know what my views are on prisons. Typical prisons today don't rehabilitate, typical prisons seek retribution and do more harm then good. A proper prison should work to educate and rehabilitate people and then put them back into society in a good position, these however rarely exists across the world. Punishment or for that matter negative or positive reinforcement are how prisons should be run, not by retribution.
[...]
I don't support the crappy, for profit, retribution styled prisons you see around the world. They do more harm than good most of the time.