Free will, morality and crime

[Imran Siddiqui]

In this world is there any real sense of morality?

Is there really any sense of morality in our current world? It is simply what certain people decided was moral. Even in a world without free will, there will still be morality, but people will create it.

Also punishment isn't just for revenge or rehabilitation, it is also simply for incapacitation, keep the criminal behind bars so he can't commit any more crimes. Even if there was no free will you would still think that the person could commit future crimes (unless you could read the future).

[orange]

no, because ultimately whatever happens would be predetermined, Imran

[orange]

whether you put him in jail or not, that would be predetermined in a world without free will, so if it was predetermined that he would commit more crimes, putting him in jail wouldn't change anything (as the act of putting him in jail, too, would be part of the predetermination)

[Imran Siddiqui]

no, because ultimately whatever happens would be predetermined, Imran

Maybe, but how would ordinary people know what was going to be determined? They wouldn't. So punishment would still have to exist, and if it is predetermined or not, it still wouldn't matter.

[Ned]

Re: Free will, morality and crime

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin
Assume that free will is 'proven' to be an illusion. That is, every act that we perform is not of conscious decision but determined by natural unchangeable progression of events.

This would mean your actions are as predetermined as night following day or a dropped object falling to the ground. There may be some random chance (i.e non-predetermination), such as with rolled die, but that is no more free will than predetermination.

In this world is there any real sense of morality? Everything we do is out of our control. Are we responsible for our actions?

If a person commits a crime are they to be held accountable? - they had no control over it. Accusing them of a crime is like accusing an hurricane of deliberate mass murder and wanton destruction.

You would want to take actions to prevent that crime, but would criminal detention as punishment be unjustifiable? What about the death penalty?

This truly sounds the core of the liberal view of responsibility. Society is the sole cause of all misbehavior.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin
If they did have a concept of self, would they be wrong? No.

Why wouldn't they be wrong? An illusion doesn't become real by being compounded by another illusion. The illusion of "self" does not cease to become an illusion just because it has been compounded by the illusion of "rational thought," and rationality cannot exist without some independent motive force (i.e. free will) -- without free will all "thought" is illusory, since it arises solely from the completely irrational process of one brain-state changing to another brain-state.

Originally posted by Ned
This truly sounds the core of the liberal view of responsibility. Society is the sole cause of all misbehavior.

Are you saying that society has free will even if people do not? What a novel suggestion.

[Zero]

If trying to prove free will exists is hard enough, trying to disprove that fate or predetermination does not exist is just as annoying.

If you like chocolate ice cream, you will buy one instead of vanilla, the one you hate... so it is predetermined. If you try to buy vanilla for sake for proving fate wrong, then it was predetermined at that point you had the desire to prove fate wrong, thus you were fated to buy vanilla...

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by loinburger


Why wouldn't they be wrong?

Because they exist. If a pocket calculator is self-aware (for whatever reason), or gives the illusion of self-awareness to everyone else, it is not wrong. It does exist whether its apparent "knowing" that it exists is illusary or not.

I think we are just using different definitions of self. I am saying that my 'self' is my existence. Whether it is rational or automated is not the issue (at least not to me).

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Also punishment isn't just for revenge or rehabilitation, it is also simply for incapacitation, keep the criminal behind bars so he can't commit any more crimes. Even if there was no free will you would still think that the person could commit future crimes (unless you could read the future).

What's the laws position on arresting people because of a crime that they are going to commit, but don't because the police stop them?

I presume conspiracy or otherwise planning a crime is illegal. In such cases detention is 'acceptable'.

But what about arresting a person for a future crime that you are almost certain will happen, before the perpetrator even contemplated the crime?


Edit - My head hurts after thinking about some feedback problems on prediction. Maybe I'll post those thoughts later.

[orange]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

no, because ultimately whatever happens would be predetermined, Imran

Maybe, but how would ordinary people know what was going to be determined? They wouldn't. So punishment would still have to exist, and if it is predetermined or not, it still wouldn't matter.

Doesn't SD's scenario imply that everyone is aware of predetermination?

[orange]

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin
But what about arresting a person for a future crime that you are almost certain will happen, before the perpetrator even contemplated the crime?

Thank you John Anderton

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by orange


Thank you John Anderton

Who's John Anderton?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Doesn't SD's scenario imply that everyone is aware of predetermination?

Even if they are, they do not know which way that predetermination will lead. Maybe predetermination says they will punish people by putting them in jail. Maybe it doesn't.

See, the thing is if people do not know the determination they will have to continue to do what they are doing because that may be the predetermined path, no?

[Drake Tungsten]

You'd still be no different than my pocket calculator, or my "speak and spell." (And who's to say that they don't share a similar illusion that their Selves exists?)

A sentient speak and spell? There's a mind-bending concept...

Wutang, my friend. Wutang indeed.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin
I think we are just using different definitions of self. I am saying that my 'self' is my existence. Whether it is rational or automated is not the issue (at least not to me).

By your "existence," do you mean your physical existence, or do you mean something else? F'rinstance, if doctors were somehow to remove your brain from your body, and hooked your brain up to one machine to keep it alive and hooked your body up to another, then which would be "you": the brain-plus-machine, or the body-plus-machine? (Or both? Or neither?) Why?

I agree that I as a body would still exist if there were no free will, but I don't believe that I as a conscious entity would exist, since consciousness cannot exist without rationality. Assuming free will, my answer to the above question would be that I would be the brain-plus-machine, since the brain's the thing that does the thinking. Assuming no free will, my answer to the above question would have to be either that both the brain-plus-machine and body-plus machine was me, or that neither was me -- similarly to how I would respond if somebody pulled the hands off of a clock, and asked me "Which is the clock -- the clockface, or the clock hands?"