An essay titled simply, beliefs

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
What I find really intruiging, is the attempt to find a reason behind these altruistic thoughts. I ascribed that completely to natural causes.

Intriguing? It scores zero points for originality.

The biggest thing for me, is when I finally got to study Darwin in earnest in first year university. What really caused me all kinds of troubles is where he says that all those with an inheritable disability are subhuman, and should not be permitted to reproduce.

My first thought is that he was wrong in this and right in everything else, but I couldn't make that fit, and really struggled for a long time trying to make that fit.

Sounds like you thought of Darwin as some sort of prophet. Why should we care about his moral views - he wasn't exactly a moral philosopher, and his times were quite different from ours.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Comrade Tassadar

Originally posted by Asher
That is a terrible essay from a terrible person.

[St Leo]

Originally posted by Seeker
You future may be predetermined with or without god...what has god got to do with things being determined or not?

Interesting idea I once heard is that, in order for us to hold people morally accountable for their actions, their actions must be 'deterministic'.

Think of it like this: In a determined universe, people's choices are made based on other factors and are determined entirely by the 'sum of factors', like historical events, knowledge, observation, etc.

But in a non-determined universe, the choices people make seem arbitrary or even random. What 'determines' a persons choice in these universe? Free Will you say. But what determines what 'Free Will' desires? Does free will add up all factors, and then make a decision? No that's determinism. 'Free Will' seems to argue that there is some sort of 'fudge factor' at work in human decisions that just seems so totally random and arbitrary to me.

To be honest, I find that quantum mechanics provides a lot of leeway even when not treated as a magic black box.

Is rolling a dice deterministic? Not quite, but it is structured. There are six possible outcomes, and none of them involved the moon turning into a giant bovine. Similarly, at the lowest level, particles aren't quite deterministic. There are n possible effects on a particle from a single cause, and they are all well defined.

This scales up to a Universe that is predetermined along infinitely many paths, rather than along one path or that is purely random.

[St Leo]

BTW, there are different kinds of infinities.

There's the Aleph-Null infinity. The set of all integers belongs to it. Integers go on indefinitely -- ..., 0, 1, 2, 3 ... -- there are infinitely many.

Then there's the Aleph-One infinity. The set of all real numbers belongs to it. Not only do real numbers continue indefinitely, but you can also find a new real number between any two other real numbers. So, the span of real numbers is both inwardly and outwardly infinite.

Integers aren't Aleph-One because you can't find a new integer between any two others. Is there an undiscovered integer between 2 and 3? No.

Mu.

[Kidlicious]

Re: An essay titled simply, beliefs

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
The second belief, which I believe that I will never discard, is that there is a capacity for good things within every human being. This comes as a result of my experiences. I have seen many people do kind things for each other without any secondary motive.

Hitler had a secondary motive.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Devils advocate question:

If free will and nondeterministic future is real how does one reconcile biblical prophecy and the chain of events required to facilitate end times?

Of course there is the St. Leo/Asimov psychohistorical explanation.

[Ben Kenobi]

Why would I defend this essay?

I think y'all have the wrong idea about it.

[Az]

I think you're giving St. Leo way too much credit here.

[Ben Kenobi]

Intriguing that I would make that argument because it is so unoriginal, and bears the imprint of my schooling at the time.

Why should we care about his moral views - he wasn't exactly a moral philosopher, and his times were quite different from ours.

When his moral views are intertwined with his model of biology, and how the species ought to operate, then they are important.

I make no defense of my previous fascination with Darwin, but those were my thoughts at the time.

[Ben Kenobi]

In that single independent clause, you already have a bad pronoun reference and a faulty parallelism. For shame.

I didn't say this was my best work, this is just the one where I come out and say which beliefs were central to me at the time.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Intriguing that I would make that argument because it is so unoriginal, and bears the imprint of my schooling at the time.

So it's intriguingly unintriguing! I'll have to grant you that.

When his moral views are intertwined with his model of biology, and how the species ought to operate, then they are important.

I'm not aware of Darwin intertwining his moral views into his biological models, but whether he did or not has solely historical interest. There's nothing moral about modern evolutionary biology.

Well, as said, it seems you had a very strange attitude to Darwin back then.

[Ben Kenobi]

From the Descent of Man: Chapter 5

http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/charles_darwin/descent_of_man/chapter_05.html

on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination; we build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed, and the sick; we institute poor-laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment.

There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox. Thus the weak members of civilised societies propagate their kind.

No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly any one is so ignorant as
to allow his worst animals to breed.

[Ben Kenobi]

but whether he did or not has solely historical interest.

We can look at the same evidence Darwin had access to and ask ourselves how his moral views shaped his analysis of the data put forth before him.

[St Leo]

Originally posted by Azazel
I think you're giving St. Leo way too much credit here.

Lousy ingrate. I swear that one day I will express myself coherently, and you shall rue the day you ever dismissed me as an Asimovite.

[Az]

If you had any respect for asimov, you wouldn't allow your worthless name to be mentioned in the same sentence as His Glory.