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Yes, this is a thread on TL that involves religion, but I hate to think that our policy should be to blindly close every such thread. Sam Harris is a writer whose books are both insightful and have sparked many good discussions in the past and as long as the thread doesn't derail I'd like to leave it open. This should be the basic premise for every such thread, no matter how high the odds of it derailing. In that light, these posts that just predict the downfall of this thread (whether it be pre-determined or not) are 1) Not contributing to the discussion 2) Backseat moderating 3) Annoying 4) Actually contributing towards derailing it. I'll keep 2 daying people for this. |
On March 09 2012 18:53 HULKAMANIA wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 18:45 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:40 HULKAMANIA wrote:On March 09 2012 18:38 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:07 churbro wrote: I dislike Sam Harris purely because he is bias towards Islam. I my self as well as an Atheist, am also an Anti-Theist (I hate religion, in all forms), but his bigotry towards Islam is infuriating at times. That's because they riot and murder when a journalist draws cartoons, they riot and murder when a solider accidentally burned a Quran, they stone their women, they incite for someone to murder Salman Rushdie. They do all this call themselves the religion of peace. The religion of peace is Buddhism. The religion of murder is Islam. In their defense, they didn't do any of those things of their own free will. Neither did bin Laden then. No free will doesn't mean we should just take it. As I've already said, the world operates as if it has free will. No, I get it. I get it. Free will doesn't exist when you want to disdain certain people based on their beliefs. Free will exists (or at least we get to pretend that it does) when you want to disdain certain people based on their actions. I have no problem with blasting people for their actions or beliefs, regardless of the existence or nonexistence of free will.
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On March 09 2012 19:19 paralleluniverse wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 18:53 HULKAMANIA wrote:On March 09 2012 18:45 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:40 HULKAMANIA wrote:On March 09 2012 18:38 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:07 churbro wrote: I dislike Sam Harris purely because he is bias towards Islam. I my self as well as an Atheist, am also an Anti-Theist (I hate religion, in all forms), but his bigotry towards Islam is infuriating at times. That's because they riot and murder when a journalist draws cartoons, they riot and murder when a solider accidentally burned a Quran, they stone their women, they incite for someone to murder Salman Rushdie. They do all this call themselves the religion of peace. The religion of peace is Buddhism. The religion of murder is Islam. In their defense, they didn't do any of those things of their own free will. Neither did bin Laden then. No free will doesn't mean we should just take it. As I've already said, the world operates as if it has free will. No, I get it. I get it. Free will doesn't exist when you want to disdain certain people based on their beliefs. Free will exists (or at least we get to pretend that it does) when you want to disdain certain people based on their actions. I have no problem with blasting people for their actions or beliefs, regardless of the existence or nonexistence of free will. Evidently.
I mean it sounds like it doesn't matter, in your mind, whether or not people are ultimately responsible their own actions. What really matters is whether or not those actions conform to your personal and admittedly subjective definition of "good" and "evil." And if they don't well then they get a good blasting.
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“If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning.”
C.S. Lewis
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On March 09 2012 19:47 HULKAMANIA wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 19:19 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:53 HULKAMANIA wrote:On March 09 2012 18:45 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:40 HULKAMANIA wrote:On March 09 2012 18:38 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 18:07 churbro wrote: I dislike Sam Harris purely because he is bias towards Islam. I my self as well as an Atheist, am also an Anti-Theist (I hate religion, in all forms), but his bigotry towards Islam is infuriating at times. That's because they riot and murder when a journalist draws cartoons, they riot and murder when a solider accidentally burned a Quran, they stone their women, they incite for someone to murder Salman Rushdie. They do all this call themselves the religion of peace. The religion of peace is Buddhism. The religion of murder is Islam. In their defense, they didn't do any of those things of their own free will. Neither did bin Laden then. No free will doesn't mean we should just take it. As I've already said, the world operates as if it has free will. No, I get it. I get it. Free will doesn't exist when you want to disdain certain people based on their beliefs. Free will exists (or at least we get to pretend that it does) when you want to disdain certain people based on their actions. I have no problem with blasting people for their actions or beliefs, regardless of the existence or nonexistence of free will. Evidently. I mean it sounds like it doesn't matter, in your mind, whether or not people are ultimately responsible their own actions. What really matters is whether or not those actions conform to your personal and admittedly subjective definition of "good" and "evil." And if they don't well then they get a good blasting. So what's the problem?
It's usually not about good and evil, it's about being right versus being wrong, which is essentially the purpose of most debates.
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The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level.
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On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. If we don't have free will, then we have no choice in what we do, whether we decide to lock them up or otherwise.
And there's plenty of good reasons to put murderers in jail, it prevents them from reoffending, it gives victims a sense of closure, it deters crime, etc.
If some mad scientists unleashed a mindless rampaging robot, your argument is do nothing about it.
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On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level.
The way I see it, if nobody has free will then we don't have any choice about punishing any of these people. On the other hand, if we might choose not to punish them because they had no free will, it follows that they, too, were excercising their free will when they committed their crimes and we should punish them for choosing to do wrong. Either way, they should be punished.
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IMO it doesn't really matter if we have free will or not unless we can predict what we're going to do before-hand and then we can change it (but then is our new decision already built in to what we're eventually going to do?).
I remember that one study where they could supposedly predict is a person would pick left or right before the person themselves had picked it... but I can't remember what it was called (and I can't find a link)....
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On March 07 2012 15:48 SnK-Arcbound wrote:Show nested quote +On March 07 2012 04:17 fishjie wrote: On March 07 2012 04:10 SnK-Arcbound wrote: Good and evil can only exist if there is an ultimate standard that exists outside people. You can't claim murder is wrong on based on religious teachings, and then discount the religious teachings that say god isn't responsible for murders but the person who commits them. Just so you can understand why I'm asking that you prove in the absence of god that murder is wrong, since that is the basic argument you are making against a "good" god existing when evil also exists and is preventable. I addressed this in a previous post, but to add to this: no christian can possibly argue for absolute morality, because the god of the bible ordered and committed genocide multiple times. not to mention slavery, misogyny, racism, stoning people to death for breaking the sabbath, etc... every time it is brought up, theists simply argue: "gods ways are above our own, who are you to judge him" if morality is absolute, i absolutely can judge the actions of bible god as evil. the fact that theists have to defend genocide kinda pokes holes in their statements. This is incorrect. First off you misunderstand people in the bible doing things, with god saying they should happen. I'm looking at the quotes from the bible about people dying, and many of them have no such quotations of "and god said ''". This means the writers were saying what the view on things were that day, not that god himself said it. Also can you explain how you know what all of gods standards are for all of gods actions, considering that god only gave men 10 of those laws to follow? And can you tell me where god said he hates all women (misogyny) and everything about people is determined by their race (racism). Now about the mass murders, there wasn't a genocide commited in the bible. The bible doesn't say god ordered the jews to kill them because they were canaanites or because they were phillistines. Only that these groups were all cannanites or phillistines. Based on the definition of genocide, any killing can be considered genocide. Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", is broad enough that killing anyone one person of any group ever to exist can be considered genocide. The allies bombed specifically german cities, and attacked specifically german armies, can be considered genocide. Genocide is defined so broadly anything can be genocide. If all killings are genocide, we can throw out the word and it's very negative meaning, and instead just look at the killings and see if they are legal. Trying to say that a genocide takes place de facto takes away the justification of a killing is incorrect, because some killings are legal, but all killings can be defined as genocide. If you disagreeing with the death penalty being your basis for this is easily defeatable as a reason, but I won't spend time writing it out unless that happens to be why you don't like killing. You say that you don't like that breaking the sabbath brings the death penalty, even though it is one of the 10 commandments. Explain to me how you know that god is breaking his own morality by killing a man the worked on the sabbath. People are mistaking inconsistencies in the bible to actually mean anything. They are not the literal words of god unless god is being quoted. Men wrote the bible. You can see them admitting in the bible that they forgot things. Factual inaccuracies in the bible don't matter, moral inconsistencies do. People are mistaking mens knowledge in the bible and gods knowledge being told. It's a categorization error. Also physics is the study of physical objects. How is "free will" a physical object, and how are people applying physics to a non physical object. I think people are making very simple errors in their thinking and it's driving them to extremes they can't back up. I'm not sure why people can't agree to disagree and let the factual nature of an assumption be found out apon death. Die and turn into nothing, well I guess you know even though you can't think. Die and meet god, you might be incredibly fucked.
ok you need to read the bible more. no genocide? hello, what is the flood? it wiped out all of humanity. that was god genociding man.
how was the slaughter of the canaanite tribes not genocide? god gave SPECIFIC instructions to kill every man, woman, and child. that's genocide.
no misogyny in the bible? cmon now. i can immediately think of one off the top of my head: 1 corinthians 14:34 "women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says."
and that's not even getting into the old testament.
its funny that you mention that the bible is written by humans. you're absolutely right. religion is MAN MADE. i'm glad you can admit that. you cherry pick the verses that you choose to believe in, and rationalize away the rest as it being "misquoting of god". you know why god is misquoted? because he does not exist. if such a supreme being actually existed, and he was capable of communicating with the world, would the various religions of the world be riddled with scientific errors, contradictions, and historical inaccuracies? imagine a bible where it was scientifically accurate, none of the passages contradicted each other, the ethics system mirrored that of today (as opposed to the ethics system in the OT, which is based on primitive tribal morals where slavery and genocide are ok). but its not, because it was written by humans CENTURIES ago.
men who wrote the various books in the bible had specific political and social world views they were trying to enforce through these stories. because the authors had different agendas, there are obviously lots of contradictions. you're right there are no moral inconsistencies, the OT god is consistently BAD. slavery, rape, genocide, infanticide, the list goes on and on.
if you admit the bible was written by men, and that it is not the inerrant word of god, then how do you know what passages to believe and what passages not to believe? how do you know your interpretation is valid and another person's is not? in other words, why believe any of it at all.
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Hey guys, Hitler didn't necessarily commit genocide...How do we know he wasn't trying to exterminate everyone, but the people he just happened to pick were Jews. It's possible.
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On March 09 2012 20:32 paralleluniverse wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. If we don't have free will, then we have no choice in what we do, whether we decide to lock them up or otherwise. And there's plenty of good reasons to put murderers in jail, it prevents them from reoffending, it gives victims a sense of closure, it deters crime, etc. If some mad scientists unleashed a mindless rampaging robot, your argument is do nothing about it.
I'm not saying they shouldn't be restrained or prevented from re-offending, my point is that they can never be held accountable for it. If I came into your house right now and destroyed everything you owned, you would have no right to be angry with me because I didn't choose to do those things. You might request that I be restrained from do so again in the future, but I can't be held accountable for anything I just did.
This is the problem, no one can ever be held responsible for what they do under this logic. There are no such things as morals anymore because morality covers only the choices you make and such would imply free will, which we have assumed to be non-existent. Good people and bad people no longer exist, the only people who exist are those who have been forced to make "good" choices and those who have been forced to make "bad" choices.
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On March 09 2012 18:38 paralleluniverse wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 18:07 churbro wrote: I dislike Sam Harris purely because he is bias towards Islam. I my self as well as an Atheist, am also an Anti-Theist (I hate religion, in all forms), but his bigotry towards Islam is infuriating at times. That's because they riot and murder when a journalist draws cartoons, they riot and murder when a marine accidentally burned a Quran, they stone their women, they incite for someone to murder Salman Rushdie. They do all this, yet still call themselves the religion of peace. Not all religions are created equal. The religion of peace is Buddhism. The religion of murder and intolerance is Islam.
what about the sinhalese buddhists and the sri lankan genocide?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinhalese_Buddhist_nationalism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sri_Lankan_Civil_War
all religions are situational: in peaceful western countries, christianity and islam are usually pretty benign. in fucked up places, they often get used to justify fucked up things.
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I might get flamed for this (maybe even banned, I don't know how that works), but I just want to put my own view on religion.
I think religion is bad.
Now, I am not saying believing something higher that watches out for you and wants you to be happy is bad.
I say the churches and the rules are bad for us all. From "No, Gay people are bad." to "Let's crash airplanes into towers", Religion does nothing good for this world and society. There is hypocrisy, there is hatred towards each other and there is just too much bad going hand in hand with religion that is, most of the time, supposed to be all about love and peace.
I say, yes, there is free will. Yeah, there might be a bigger plan going on for all of us, but while things could hint towards that, I like to believe we can all ignore those and go our own way, twisting and changing the story as we want it to.
There are people that tell me they like to pray to god to watch out for them so they feel save. Alright, I am totally fine with that.
But then they tell me there parents told them going to a party at night with their friends could result in a spot in hell, and I just bang my head against the wall and ask why parents think they can use the church to brainwash their children.
So to sum it up, I can say: Believing in a god is fine with me. Basing rules around this god, telling others how to live their lives, cause that is what God would want them to do, that is where I say screw religion.
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On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level.
This argument always comes up and let me summarize why it's false.
First off we punish people for their actions and their intent. None of this changes without free will it just means that intent is formed through experience. For example some guy's wife cheats on him and he goes out and kills the other guy. Not everyone will have that reaction and it depends on the individual personality and their past experience even something like hormone level and things like that but all these things come together to form the intent. It's still cause and effect, it doesn't prevent people from making decisions it just means those decisions are determined by the past.
Look at another scenario: some robot goes around and kills people. You still "punish" the robot even if you agree it had no free will in it's decisions. People can change if you punish them, therefore most/all crimes are not punished by death but seek to rehabilitate the person. Again this is cause (punish/rehab) and effect (less likely to commit crime).
Memories are just past experiences and are stored in the brain in neurons that carry the information electrically and chemically. Ideas are synthesis of memories. Saying "they are less understood" doesn't imply free will somehow.
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On March 10 2012 06:35 Marth753 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 20:32 paralleluniverse wrote:On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. If we don't have free will, then we have no choice in what we do, whether we decide to lock them up or otherwise. And there's plenty of good reasons to put murderers in jail, it prevents them from reoffending, it gives victims a sense of closure, it deters crime, etc. If some mad scientists unleashed a mindless rampaging robot, your argument is do nothing about it. I'm not saying they shouldn't be restrained or prevented from re-offending, my point is that they can never be held accountable for it. If I came into your house right now and destroyed everything you owned, you would have no right to be angry with me because I didn't choose to do those things. You might request that I be restrained from do so again in the future, but I can't be held accountable for anything I just did. This is the problem, no one can ever be held responsible for what they do under this logic. There are no such things as morals anymore because morality covers only the choices you make and such would imply free will, which we have assumed to be non-existent. Good people and bad people no longer exist, the only people who exist are those who have been forced to make "good" choices and those who have been forced to make "bad" choices. I don't see how that's a problem. Knowledge and understanding of things can almost always be used to our advantage and I can't think of any reasons why a better understanding of "free will" would be bad. How would it not be a good thing to have a deeper understanding of human behavior for example?
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On March 10 2012 06:53 L3gendary wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. This argument always comes up and let me summarize why it's false. First off we punish people for their actions and their intent. None of this changes without free will it just means that intent is formed through experience. For example some guy's wife cheats on him and he goes out and kills the other guy. Not everyone will have that reaction and it depends on the individual personality and their past experience even something like hormone level and things like that but all these things come together to form the intent. It's still cause and effect, it doesn't prevent people from making decisions it just means those decisions are determined by the past. Look at another scenario: some robot goes around and kills people. You still "punish" the robot even if you agree it had no free will in it's decisions. People can change if you punish them, therefore most/all crimes are not punished by death but seek to rehabilitate the person. Again this is cause (punish/rehab) and effect (less likely to commit crime). Memories are just past experiences and are stored in the brain in neurons that carry the information electrically and chemically. Ideas are synthesis of memories. Saying "they are less understood" doesn't imply free will somehow.
But this doesn't change the fact that this excuses them from everything they did before hand. Under this logic, just to take this to the extreme to show how it's flawed, Hitler did nothing wrong but was simply educated incorrectly and should have been rehabilitated. Under this logic, Hitler was forced to kill millions of Jews by all of his experiences and memories which were, by extension, forced upon him. Under this logic once again, Hitler was just a poor soul forced to kill millions of Jews who we should have reached out to and helped.
If the only reason to punish someone is to rehabilitate them, then let's assume something. There are two ways to fix Hitler from killing millions of Jews ever again: therapeutic care in some tropical paradise that relieves Hitler of his hatred and is simultaneously enjoyable, or send him to jail and show him just how bad his actions were. If you're assuming that all we should do is rehabilitate people then either option is perfectly fine because they fix Hitler from killing again, and yet the whole world would be appalled if you went with the first option because that is not what he deserves. Most people would admit that the second option is appropriate because that is what Hitler deserves for killing 6 million people. And why? Because he consciously made the choice to do something so horrible that it cannot be justified.
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On March 09 2012 10:09 LaughingTulkas wrote:Show nested quote +On March 09 2012 06:48 seppolevne wrote:On March 09 2012 03:22 LaughingTulkas wrote:On March 08 2012 21:00 run.at.me wrote:On March 08 2012 19:38 shinyA wrote:On March 08 2012 18:47 [F_]aths wrote:On March 08 2012 12:37 LaughingTulkas wrote:On March 07 2012 23:20 [F_]aths wrote:On March 07 2012 23:12 seppolevne wrote:On March 07 2012 21:11 [F_]aths wrote: [quote] Please dont use nazis to make your point. It now can look that I am defending Hitler when I am argue against the existence of actual free will.
A person can be evil even when there is no real free will. The moral terms of good and evil don't require free will. If you inflict unnecessary pain and misery, you are evil. You do have choices. If you had a brain tumor which somehow made you inflicting pain, you are probably not seen as evil since the tumor made you do it by bypassing reasoning. As long as you can reason, you can be good or evil. I think you need to spend a little more time realizing the consequences of no free will... Do you mind to explain why? No free will doesn't release you from being responsible. If we could demonstrate right here with absolute certainty that free will doesn't exist, it doesn't mean you can go around an kill people because it was just proven that you had no free will. It would be an evil act regardless. I think he means that you aren't really applying your belief in non free will very accurately. Even in your reply that I'm quoting, you speak as if going around a killing people was a choice. If we could demonstrate right now with absolute certainty that free will didn't exist, and then I went and killed people, it would not be because I chose to on the basis of your argument, as you just demonstrated I cannot chose! In the same way if by chance I didn't go and kill people, it would be because I didn't have the choice to. Either way, it's not my choice, so how are you talking about things as if I was choosing even with the presupposition that I cannot, in fact, choose? Evil really does become meaningless. If you punish me for killing those people, it's not because I am evil that you do it, it's because you are predetermined to punish me, it's not something you chose to do because I was "evil" it just was. If there is no free will, then all that we do is the same as a rock falling when we let it go, it simply happens. It is not good or bad in and of itself, it simply is. And it is because there is no way it could be any different. If this is what you believe, I may disagree with you, but I respect you, because you are consistent to your premises. If you want to play games and say that you can not have free will but still have good and evil, I think you are most likely deceiving yourself (knowingly or unknowingly). If you're offended, don't worry, you were just determined to be offended, just as I was determined to write this post. I see "good" and "evil" as a concept which is useful to describe and value certain actions. The lack of actual free will doesn't render the concept meaningless, I think. Even if the world could be proven to be 100% deterministic (if I understand quantum mechanics right, it is not, but lets assume that for the sake of the argument) we are still obliged, I think, to punish evil actions and increase the goodness in the world. I would see this as important part of the concept of good an evil: The "ought" in it. We can have that ought without free will, because if we act accordingly, we can reduce the misery and increase the well-being of conscious creatures. It is a good act regardless if we chose it by actual free will or not. I still have the feeling that we are discussing different points. So many problems arise with that stance though because you are still taking a subjective stance to good and evil. If we just considered good anything that benefits our survival and evil anything that threatens it you come up with questions of like 'is it good or evil to murder evil people?'. I'd be curious though as to how you would define good and evil if you are taking a deterministic view. As a previous poster mentioned the deterministic view would take this approach: (I dont know how to quote something from a different page so i copied and pasted it) -FalahNorei you could compare him to a gear wheel that becomes rusty, is it guilty of becoming rusty? no. should it be replaced and thrown away? yup, otherwise endangers the whole engine, like a murderer endangers other people. depending on how rusty the gearwheel is, it either gets thrown away or one tries to clean it, thats comparable to the different sentences and punishments for different crimes. As good and evil are just subjective terms based on the belief systems of the accuser, you can't really define them from any standpoint without being subjective. The deterministic view, imo, would just suggest that good and evil doesn't exist - not because it's subjective in nature, but because everyone is the same, just products of their environment and therefore cannot be held 'responsible' for their actions - positive or negative. I personally take the view of compatibilism which ill just copy and paste from google because I can't be bothered writin it out: ompatibilists (aka soft determinists) often define an instance of "free will" as one in which the agent had freedom to act. That is, the agent was not coerced or restrained. Arthur Schopenhauer famously said "Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills".[2] In other words, although an agent may often be free to act according to a motive, the nature of that motive is determined. The nature of the discussion that the OP is more about hard determinism. People seem to misunderstand what he is trying to say, especially about 'responsibility of actions'. This is not really the point hes getting at... This logic fails because it assumes the ability to choose to replace the "rusty" gear. You don't have that choice. If you do replace it, you haven't made anything better, you are just acting as you are determined, because you are also part of the machine. You did not chose to replace it because it was bad, you had no choice in the matter. There is no outside engineer to replace faulty parts. There is only the machine. Whatever the machine does is simply what it does, it is not "good" or "bad." The analogy also fails on another level because it tacitly assumes a standard of good and bad. It is clear in a machine that rusty parts are objectively bad. You cannot use this assumption to prove that bad is bad. You are declaring it bad by definition. Think of it this way. Is killing bad? Yes just like a rusty gear is bad. Why is rust bad? It prevents the part from working as designed and prevents the machine from running optimally. So killing must the world from operating as designed and from running optimally? ???? See where we got? In order for the analogy to work, you must prove that killing is objectively bad for the universe as a whole, when clearly the life or death of a small piece of matter on a small planet orbiting a small sun doesn't affect the universe in the slightest. One might much more conclusively argue that humans killing each other is just part of "the way the world works." So in your "proof" of evil, you have really just assumed that evil exists. Determinism is the death of morality and meaning. If you are consistent in its application. Where did his logic assume a choice of whether to replace the gear or not? he said "should it be replaced and thrown away? yup". Which is the same as your machine, you just DO. Not cause rusty gears are "bad" but because otherwise the machine doesn't work. So you just do. Clearly the word "should" implies a choice between two options, one of which should be chosen and the other should not. In determinism, the machine always works, there are no rusty gears, so I won't bother to defend your other attacks on the analogy.And do you not see that your own second point invalidates your first? You say "It prevents the part from working as designed and prevents the machine from running optimally." and "Yes just like a rusty gear is bad." but then right before say "If you do replace it, you haven't made anything better", but you have removed a bad part, you have improved the machine over its previous state. That's making something better. I think you just misunderstood this argument, if you are part of the machine, and you think you removed a bad part, you haven't actually made the machine better, because you are simply doing your part of the machine. Make more sense?And how do you make this jump? "you haven't made anything better, you are just acting as you are determined" why does one require the other? Maybe I'm not seeing an extra step? See above. You are part of the machine, acting deterministically. You are not acting critically to improve anything, you are acting without choice.And another small mistake, "Is killing bad? Yes just like a rusty gear is bad." The killer is the rusty gear, and killING would be like rust. Is rust bad? No, it is rust. Is rust on a gear bad? Yes, because it prevents etc.... So is killing bad? No. But if killing is screwing with your machine then you best stamp it out. I don't care if the universe doesn't give a SHIT about whether rust is a cool guy or not, I don't like it so get the fuck outta my machine. We just have to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to keep there OWN machine clean. If your machine gets killer rust (you would dislike being killed) then there should be a way to keep your machine clean. It will naturally stay clean, as you will naturally not die (at least in a day-to-day sense) so thats fine. The only way it will get rusty is if some fucker comes and rusts it up. Curse you oxygen! So you throw that shit in jail, or kill it, or whatever, so that it doesn't rust your machine again, or someone else's machine. But you have to prove that killing someone affects negatively the functioning of the universe, which of course it doesn't, that's my point. By assuming that killing someone is a negative impact on the universe, you are in fact assuming that it is evil! But this is supposed to be the a "proof" that evil can exist! See how that's circular?Two guys are banging their machines together? Hey, if their machines can withstand that than by all means continue. They aren't banging them into your machine. Your machine will similarily not bang naturally. So you don't need protection from these two guys banging their OWN machines together, but if you go break it up than they need protection against YOU (homosexuality is ok and should be protected, basically). Your machine may just 'do' but that is still something that can be strived for. If a machine is not for doing then why be a machine at all? But it is, so do it does. Allowing machines to DO whatever it is they do could be morality, could it not? The machine here is the universe, and no, just because it exists does not mean it has a purpose. And no, since you are part of the universe, allowing it to be the universe is not morality. My replies in bold italics. Also, by the way, I don't believe in determinism, but I think people who do should be consistent about it. edit: formatting Does multiple options require choice? A machine programmed to 'pick the highest number', when given 3 4 7, has options but couldn't be said to have a choice. Why is the machine the whole universe and not only the observable universe? I'm still a little confused by this machine thing. Every day a new journey ^^" I don't know... for some reason I can't let go of the role of the observer, help me out.
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On March 10 2012 08:14 Marth753 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 10 2012 06:53 L3gendary wrote:On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. This argument always comes up and let me summarize why it's false. First off we punish people for their actions and their intent. None of this changes without free will it just means that intent is formed through experience. For example some guy's wife cheats on him and he goes out and kills the other guy. Not everyone will have that reaction and it depends on the individual personality and their past experience even something like hormone level and things like that but all these things come together to form the intent. It's still cause and effect, it doesn't prevent people from making decisions it just means those decisions are determined by the past. Look at another scenario: some robot goes around and kills people. You still "punish" the robot even if you agree it had no free will in it's decisions. People can change if you punish them, therefore most/all crimes are not punished by death but seek to rehabilitate the person. Again this is cause (punish/rehab) and effect (less likely to commit crime). Memories are just past experiences and are stored in the brain in neurons that carry the information electrically and chemically. Ideas are synthesis of memories. Saying "they are less understood" doesn't imply free will somehow. But this doesn't change the fact that this excuses them from everything they did before hand. Under this logic, just to take this to the extreme to show how it's flawed, Hitler did nothing wrong but was simply educated incorrectly and should have been rehabilitated. Under this logic, Hitler was forced to kill millions of Jews by all of his experiences and memories which were, by extension, forced upon him. Under this logic once again, Hitler was just a poor soul forced to kill millions of Jews who we should have reached out to and helped. If the only reason to punish someone is to rehabilitate them, then let's assume something. There are two ways to fix Hitler from killing millions of Jews ever again: therapeutic care in some tropical paradise that relieves Hitler of his hatred and is simultaneously enjoyable, or send him to jail and show him just how bad his actions were. If you're assuming that all we should do is rehabilitate people then either option is perfectly fine because they fix Hitler from killing again, and yet the whole world would be appalled if you went with the first option because that is not what he deserves. Most people would admit that the second option is appropriate because that is what Hitler deserves for killing 6 million people. And why? Because he consciously made the choice to do something so horrible that it cannot be justified. Hitler wasn't "forced" to do anything because that implies that it is happening against his will, but it IS his will. Hitler did something VERY wrong, he WAS simply educated/experienced incorrectly and yes, if it could happen he should be rehabilitated. Just because you can't stomach it doesn't mean it's flawed.
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On March 10 2012 08:23 seppolevne wrote:Show nested quote +On March 10 2012 08:14 Marth753 wrote:On March 10 2012 06:53 L3gendary wrote:On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. This argument always comes up and let me summarize why it's false. First off we punish people for their actions and their intent. None of this changes without free will it just means that intent is formed through experience. For example some guy's wife cheats on him and he goes out and kills the other guy. Not everyone will have that reaction and it depends on the individual personality and their past experience even something like hormone level and things like that but all these things come together to form the intent. It's still cause and effect, it doesn't prevent people from making decisions it just means those decisions are determined by the past. Look at another scenario: some robot goes around and kills people. You still "punish" the robot even if you agree it had no free will in it's decisions. People can change if you punish them, therefore most/all crimes are not punished by death but seek to rehabilitate the person. Again this is cause (punish/rehab) and effect (less likely to commit crime). Memories are just past experiences and are stored in the brain in neurons that carry the information electrically and chemically. Ideas are synthesis of memories. Saying "they are less understood" doesn't imply free will somehow. But this doesn't change the fact that this excuses them from everything they did before hand. Under this logic, just to take this to the extreme to show how it's flawed, Hitler did nothing wrong but was simply educated incorrectly and should have been rehabilitated. Under this logic, Hitler was forced to kill millions of Jews by all of his experiences and memories which were, by extension, forced upon him. Under this logic once again, Hitler was just a poor soul forced to kill millions of Jews who we should have reached out to and helped. If the only reason to punish someone is to rehabilitate them, then let's assume something. There are two ways to fix Hitler from killing millions of Jews ever again: therapeutic care in some tropical paradise that relieves Hitler of his hatred and is simultaneously enjoyable, or send him to jail and show him just how bad his actions were. If you're assuming that all we should do is rehabilitate people then either option is perfectly fine because they fix Hitler from killing again, and yet the whole world would be appalled if you went with the first option because that is not what he deserves. Most people would admit that the second option is appropriate because that is what Hitler deserves for killing 6 million people. And why? Because he consciously made the choice to do something so horrible that it cannot be justified. Hitler wasn't "forced" to do anything because that implies that it is happening against his will, but it IS his will. Hitler did something VERY wrong, he WAS simply educated/experienced incorrectly and yes, if it could happen he should be rehabilitated. Just because you can't stomach it doesn't mean it's flawed.
Can you clarify this statement? Because it sounds like you acknowledged that he has free will to choose what to do and that to kill 6 million people was his will so he chose it.
Anyways, to say that we should send Hitler to his favorite paradise island to be rehabilitated would be to reward incorrect behavior. If we reward incorrect behavior, even if it rehabilitates the criminal, then we prompt a whole bunch of people to act in whatever way gets them to paradise island themselves.
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On March 10 2012 08:35 Marth753 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 10 2012 08:23 seppolevne wrote:On March 10 2012 08:14 Marth753 wrote:On March 10 2012 06:53 L3gendary wrote:On March 09 2012 20:21 Marth753 wrote: The problem I see in this argument is that, if you're proposing that there is no free will in the universe, then we should never punish anyone ever for anything they do because it wasn't their choice to act that way. Did Hitler, Charles Manson, and (insert any murderer here) kill someone? Well who cares, because he had no free will to do so. Just like a man lead around like a marionette they should not be held accountable for their actions because they did not act out of their free will.
Yes, some decisions are made reflexively and that's not really operating out of your free will because then it really is the reactions of a bunch of atoms. For any other animal you'd be right in saying they have no (or at least rarely have) free will because they function on a more mechanical level, but ideas and memories and choices aren't just matter, they're something else on a less understood level. This argument always comes up and let me summarize why it's false. First off we punish people for their actions and their intent. None of this changes without free will it just means that intent is formed through experience. For example some guy's wife cheats on him and he goes out and kills the other guy. Not everyone will have that reaction and it depends on the individual personality and their past experience even something like hormone level and things like that but all these things come together to form the intent. It's still cause and effect, it doesn't prevent people from making decisions it just means those decisions are determined by the past. Look at another scenario: some robot goes around and kills people. You still "punish" the robot even if you agree it had no free will in it's decisions. People can change if you punish them, therefore most/all crimes are not punished by death but seek to rehabilitate the person. Again this is cause (punish/rehab) and effect (less likely to commit crime). Memories are just past experiences and are stored in the brain in neurons that carry the information electrically and chemically. Ideas are synthesis of memories. Saying "they are less understood" doesn't imply free will somehow. But this doesn't change the fact that this excuses them from everything they did before hand. Under this logic, just to take this to the extreme to show how it's flawed, Hitler did nothing wrong but was simply educated incorrectly and should have been rehabilitated. Under this logic, Hitler was forced to kill millions of Jews by all of his experiences and memories which were, by extension, forced upon him. Under this logic once again, Hitler was just a poor soul forced to kill millions of Jews who we should have reached out to and helped. If the only reason to punish someone is to rehabilitate them, then let's assume something. There are two ways to fix Hitler from killing millions of Jews ever again: therapeutic care in some tropical paradise that relieves Hitler of his hatred and is simultaneously enjoyable, or send him to jail and show him just how bad his actions were. If you're assuming that all we should do is rehabilitate people then either option is perfectly fine because they fix Hitler from killing again, and yet the whole world would be appalled if you went with the first option because that is not what he deserves. Most people would admit that the second option is appropriate because that is what Hitler deserves for killing 6 million people. And why? Because he consciously made the choice to do something so horrible that it cannot be justified. Hitler wasn't "forced" to do anything because that implies that it is happening against his will, but it IS his will. Hitler did something VERY wrong, he WAS simply educated/experienced incorrectly and yes, if it could happen he should be rehabilitated. Just because you can't stomach it doesn't mean it's flawed. Can you clarify this statement? Because it sounds like you acknowledged that he has free will to choose what to do and that to kill 6 million people was his will so he chose it. Anyways, to say that we should send Hitler to his favorite paradise island to be rehabilitated would be to reward incorrect behavior. If we reward incorrect behavior, even if it rehabilitates the criminal, then we prompt a whole bunch of people to act in whatever way gets them to paradise island themselves. you're still making a false connection between the lack of free will and a lack of responsibility. people will do to someone who acts like hitler what people tend to do to what someone acts like hitler. there will be plenty of people who condone harsh punishment, just as there are plenty of people who don't. their reasons don't necessarily have free will behind them either. the agency with power in the scenario (usually some kind of government organization) will ultimately make the decision, which doesn't necessarily require free will either.
the possibility of rehabilitating people is still independent of the possibility of free will, one cannot make an argument for the other.
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