• Philosophy and Spirituality
    Welcome Guest
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules
    Threads of Note Socialize
  • P&S Moderators: JackARoe | Cheshire_Kat

Determinism and morality

polymath

polymath

Bluelight Crew
Joined
Nov 4, 2010
Messages
1,890
Location
Northern Europe
Ok, Yerg mentioned this subject yesterday in another thread in SLR, so I thought I should to make a thread for that here...

The 19th century classical physics still said that everything that happens in the universe is pre-determined by the laws of physics. They even imagined a hypothetical creature called "Laplace's demon" that was so intelligent that it could predict all the future events in the whole universe, basing its prediction on physical laws...

The quantum mechanics that was developed in early 20th century is not that deterministic, it says that when mechanical systems are in the microscopic scale, their state develops deterministically as long as no one is observing them, but as soon as an observation is made, there are only statistical probabilities of what state they are found in... I'm a physicist myself and I have a job in the university, and this is familiar to me, but it's probably difficult to describe the concept of quantum indeterminacy to a lay-person.

Now, the subject of this thread is, how to apply the determinacy/indeterminacy to human behaviour(a human is a mechanical system, too)... If all human behaviour were deterministic, there obviously would be no freedom of choice, everything would be pre-determined... There would be no moral choices, even the terrible deeds of murderers and pedophiles could not be blamed because they were pre-determined by physical laws...

Obviously people need indeterminacy, because if there were no moral decisions, because of physical laws, then there would be no moral motive to even find out what those very laws are! All human behaviour is based on supposing that you can make either right or wrong decisions...

I don't speak native English, and it's difficult for me to discuss a subject this abstract coherently in this language, but I hope you got my point... What do you think, is the universe deterministic or indeterministic?
 
In cases of someone doing something that blatantly goes against society, judgment doesn't really matter. If circumstance has turned someone into a monster, they need to be separated from society regardless of the cause for their turning. Incarceration is not supposed to be a punishment, after all... it is supposed to be about protecting safety and rehabilitating if possible. This agrees with morality (utilitarianism) just fine IMO.

I really don't see a problem with calling misguided, dangerous people "evil". Even if it was not their choice to become this way, the end result is that they are this way.
 
^^ That's exactly why I support indeterminism... I think there is such a thing as real evil, that's not just not caused by consequences...
 
the universe i feel is deterministic...

the belief and idea of "good and evil" is humanistic,
" They even imagined a hypothetical creature called "Laplace's demon" "

they even further instilled this " good and evil " sense with the introduction of a "demon" or maybe it should be known as ' Daimon ' this entity was described as being able to 'translate', not 'dictate'; sounds akin to 'dominion'.

the route our existence took, was a route predetermined - as were any other paths we could of taken as a society - any advancements we can make, can only be made from what resources and intelligence we have. to an "observer" who has the ability to see where our logic can take us, we are assumed of then with like validity.

this doesnt mean let us forgive all crimes to me, but to understand that we are a society; a pool in which we all cause a ripple that does shape and touch each other eventually.

by ignoring and fearing an important part of our society, and not recognize it as that 'a part of our society' we are only ignoring what isnt going away, and so feeding it further by not understanding, thus generating more fear(which is convenient to some)...
 
polymath said:
^^ That's exactly why I support indeterminism... I think there is such a thing as real evil, that's not just not caused by consequences...
Click to expand...



I agree with you because I believe there is such a thing as evil. Jeffrey Dahmer for example was brought up in a safe environment where everything seemed normal, at least he says it was & so do the reports I have read. He was never sexually molested, etc.....but wound up drilling holes in peoples heads, & you know the rest of the story. Thats pure evil.
 
This is still a question that baffles me all the time. It seems we can't change things that have happened in the past (if there is such a thing) but at the same time it appears we are in charge of the decisions we make.

I think we can do what we ultimately want to in accordance with the laws of the Universe.

It's really tough to say.
 
I don't think it's that tough? I'm not quantum physicist, so I can't say this with authority, but some people that are a little more versed in this subject have given me a condensed version. It seems that quantum physics' probabilistic account of the universe may not prove determinism but certainly does not suggest free will.
 
^That's the long and short of it. Random chance cannot lead to true agency any more than mechanistic processes.

I agree with what Pegasus is saying here, we can separate value from blame. When we say "bad dog", are we blaming the dog for its actions? Not as such, at least not in the same way that we might blame a person. In fact, we talk about cups of coffee, films, haircuts, being bad. There is no responsibility, nor freedom of choice, required of the object in order for us to to make these value judgments. Can not our morality be seen in the same way? I think we must turn away from the Kantian idea that freedom is a prerequisite, because in light of not only determinism, but of our intrinsic animal nature, that requirement can never be met. If we are to salvage anything from the jaws of moral nihilism, I think that we must commit to this uncoupling. The differences in the ways we treat "ordinary" value and the value of people and their actions must be eroded.

I am aware that this proposal is going to have some pretty ugly consequences, but a few months ago I was really struggling with the problem of free will (I mean, it was actually having a tangible detrimental effect on my life:
This issue has given me a great deal of thought recently. I experience cognitive dissonance on the issue; on the one hand, I am convinced by both physical and metaphysical arguments for determinism. On the other hand, I act and behave as if I were a free agent, and as if everyone else were. If someone does something that is harmful to me, I do not think to myself "it was unavoidable, he had no choice in the matter"; I am angry with the person for the choice that they made. It seems so difficult to make something meaningful out of life if I reject the idea of free will, that I choose to essentially disregard the results of my analysis because, frankly, it conflicts with what I want to believe.

Now, if I think it's acceptable to reject the conclusions of science and reason because they seem to make my life less meaningful- why should I stop there? Why should I not adopt a religion? After all, I can see that it is clearly a fruitful belief for many people to have, one that gives them structure and value in their lives. If I am willing to act as if determinism were false out of personal preference, why should I not also act as if Christianity were true?
Click to expand...

For me, the abandoning of my Kantian beliefs was totally necessary in order to make any sense of the notion of value.
 
With google you can find some pages on this subject, for example: http://home.vicnet.net.au/~atheist/FREEWILL.htm

Physical determinism is the idea that the universe is the product of entities acting according to natural laws, and so everything that occurs is the consequence of the laws acting upon some initial conditions. Everything in the universe had to happen in the way it has done, without exception. This applies to living things as well as inanimate, and includes every action, thought and will of human beings. We could never have done anything differently or thought differently about anything. So physical determinism, if it is valid, precludes free will.
Click to expand...

If determinism can dictate the development of physical and biological systems, so can it allow social and conceptional ones. Therefore, in a deterministic world, individual people and societies could have systems of ethics, and behave in accordance with them. But such systems would be pre-determined. The continued widespread existence of ethical systems throughout the world would merely mean that they seemed to help societies to survive. In fact, irrespective of whether determinism is true, ethical systems seem to be essential for the survival of societies. So a deterministic world in which people generally acted as if free will existed could look very like the world we know. It would be to hard argue, though, that such deterministic acts could carry moral responsibility.
Click to expand...

There's also some talk about quantum indeterminism on that page.
 
Yerg said:
For me, the abandoning of my Kantian beliefs was totally necessary in order to make any sense of the notion of value.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry for double posting, but I had to say something to this... I really dislike Kant... For example in his "categorical imperative" he says that It's morally wrong to do anything that could not be accepted as a general law that everyone obeys. According to that, it's for example morally wrong for someone to be exclusively homosexual, because if everyone did that, man would become extinct...
 
Last edited:
^Yep. Kant's moral philosophy seems very harsh and unappealling when you first encounter it. However, you need to view his ideas holistically, and within the context of his thought the ideas suddenly seem quite natural results. I hated the categorical imperative when I first studied it, but it really grew on me, and has been very influential on my own ideas. The thing about it is that it is so wonderfully consistent and fair. As I say, I finally had to abandon it, but I still hold the idea with great respect.

btw, you can edit your own posts if you have something to add.
 
Yerg said:
^Yep. Kant's moral philosophy seems very harsh and unappealling when you first encounter it. However, you need to view his ideas holistically, and within the context of his thought the ideas suddenly seem quite natural results. I hated the categorical imperative when I first studied it, but it really grew on me, and has been very influential on my own ideas. The thing about it is that it is so wonderfully consistent and fair. As I say, I finally had to abandon it, but I still hold the idea with great respect.

btw, you can edit your own posts if you have something to add.
Click to expand...

THIS

I'm with Kant here, with a few personal tweaks:)
 
Last edited:
Yes, of course one has to think of Kant's ideas in the context that he lived in the 18th century... The society's thoughts about morality were obviously a bit different back then. I agree that Kant's works are of great value in the history of philosophy.
 
^It's not so much the social context as his own philosophical context. Kant produced a unified philosophical theory of incredible depth and complexity, and to take any one part of it and examine it without understanding the relationship it bears to his philosophy as a whole is a mistake imo.
 
Pegasus said:
^Could it not just be mental illness?
Click to expand...



Yes it could be but their are alot of mental illness patients that dont go around doing what he did. You can state he took the next step which was acting upon his urges, something other mental patients wont do because of consequences. So if consequences are holding back other mental patients from crossing the imaginary line of killing someone, then Jeffrey was more than a mental illness patient imo.

When people are confronted with evil, especially if they are non believers, they usually call it mental iilness. When someone is possessed, some like to say its mental illness when others believe they are possessed by an evil entity. Scientist & doctors like to use the phrase mental illness with possessed people while their heads are spinning & they are floating in the air.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top