Death 'Penalty' revisited.

[Ned]

Being a laissez faire kinda guy (live and let live): I'm not inclined to disabuse you of your self-assessment (that you're a toaster).

As you were...

See my last comment to you on the "Climate Change" thread.

It applies to this one as well.

[thedoc]

Being a laissez faire kinda guy (live and let live): I'm not inclined to disabuse you of your self-assessment (that you're a toaster).

As you were...

See my last comment to you on the "Climate Change" thread.

It applies to this one as well.

Ned is a determinist, and has no free will, he does whatever he does as a reaction to whatever has happened, and should not be held accountable for anything he posts. So be it.

Henry and I have the freedom to choose what we say and post, so be it.

[Ned]

Cause-and effect-chains, doc....Cause-and-effect chains!

Remember that!

[thedoc]

Cause-and effect-chains, doc....Cause-and-effect chains!

Remember that!

Cause-and effect-chains, do not rule out free will, it is only one of the influences.

[Ned]

Cause-and effect-chains, doc....Cause-and-effect chains!

Remember that!

Cause-and effect-chains, do not rule out free will, it is only one of the influences.

Sorry doc, this did not make sense either.

Either effects have causes, or you are talking about a non-material soul (I know you are) which is a hypothesis that you can't define and can't support.

[thedoc]

Cause-and effect-chains, doc....Cause-and-effect chains!

Remember that!

Cause-and effect-chains, do not rule out free will, it is only one of the influences.

Sorry doc, this did not make sense either.

Either effects have causes, or you are talking about a non-material soul (I know you are) which is a hypothesis that you can't define and can't support.

Yes, those effects have causes, but there is no cause that is absolute, and therefore there is no cause that absolutely rules out free will. Absolutes do not exist in any world you care to describe.

[Ned]

doc, you are talking religion again (of course) and I just suggested, in another thread, that we stop discussing religion, because anything you say that involves religious 'arguments' doesn't make any sense to my rational mind. Such as this last post you made.

[Ginkgo]

What has that got to do with the difference, ethically and logically speaking?

Nothing, but you are a constitutional republic.

Well, I am not, but that's beside the point.
You can still support it or fight against it, based on your conscience or on your logical mind that wants consistency.

So, what is the difference, ethically and logically speaking, between killing a human being with a sick body and killing one with a sick mind"? Why is one murder and the other isn't?

Well ,I not sure that it is beside the point. I thought your question was in relation to the United States. In this respect it is a legal decision that has been handed down. Not all legal decisions encapsulate ethical decisions.


I think the answer to your original question is pretty straightforward. Not every one who commits heinous crimes does so because they have a sick mind. In this respect the psychological distinction between a sound mind and a sick mind often reflects the legal decision.

[Ned]

If you think that "one who commits heinous crimes" has a healthy mind, then you have a very strange definition of 'healthy' -- as I said in a previous post before.

[Wyman]

Ned,

If we're all bio-automata (illusory selves riding along and fooled by our meat cars [organic bits]), then of what use it is to talk about justice?

If the bad guy does what he does cuz he has no choice, then those who would execute him have no choice either.

You're fence-sittin’ and I'd like you to come down offa it and plant your feet firmly.

We choose, are autonomous, have agency (and are responsible for ourselves), or, we're determined organic machinery and aren't responsible for jack.

Which is it?

Ditto.

Ned, you're talking out of both sides of your mouth.
In a post responding to my last, you accept the 'golden rule' as if it were written in stone and as if we are all required to accept it as well. Are you saying you believe the Gospels to be divinely inspired and so are appealing to authority (or should I say 'Authority')? As I'm pretty sure that's not what you're getting at, you'll have to do a better job arguing for your presumptions.

[Ned]

Wyman, I am sorry that you did not follow my arguments.

I know: life, consciousness, etc., are extremely complex phenomena, poorly understood and just being probed by science.

It is a bit similar to the mystery of wave-particle duality in physics (I am sure you are familiar with it) that also baffles the human mind.

So, we are reduced to speculate and to form our opinions based on partial knowledge and on our life experiences.

So I did, and so do all of you.

But..."presumptions"???

[Wyman]

Wyman, I am sorry that you did not follow my arguments.

I know: life, consciousness, etc., are extremely complex phenomena, poorly understood and just being probed by science.

It is a bit similar to the mystery of wave-particle duality in physics (I am sure you are familiar with it) that also baffles the human mind.

So, we are reduced to speculate and to form our opinions based on partial knowledge and on our life experiences.

So I did, and so do all of you.

But..."presumptions"???

Yes, upon what do you base your ethics and why? That's all I'm asking. The denial of free will is not new, although I will say that it has baffled many great minds. As I referenced above, Dostoevsky grappled with it extensively in Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov. I think the impetus behind much of Nietzsche's writing came from the same well. These were 19th century writers responding to both the results of Newtonian physics, new idea of socialism, as well as the new 'discovery' of the subconscious - the unconscious impulses that seem to guide our actions - counter to the idea of free will. Of course there have been countless others who have explored the subject.

I do get impatient with people who discover some idea and then act as if it is shiny and new and that other people just don't understand it - "if only others were 'aware' of the idea, they would see at once how my conclusions follow." The idea is not new, it is just that your conclusions do not necessarily follow -i.e. you act as if they follow from the fact that there is no such thing as free will and I pointed out that they do not; rather, they follow from your adoption of 'the Golden rule' as a maxim (or presumption, assumption, axiom, etc.)

[Ned]

As I said, Wyman, I am sorry that you did not follow my logic.

As far as presuming that you know what I think about the rest of you, it is indeed a true presumption, to which you are entitled, of course, but it is neither here nor there.

This might be a good point to stop the dialogue and reflect on what has been said before.

[henry quirk]

"Cause-and effect-chains"

There's nuthin' about *agency that denies cause and effect. Each of us is mired in countless causal chains.

Where the Determinist and the Agent part company: the Determinist believes him- or her-self a mere link in those chains, capable of nuthin' and responsible for nuthin', while the Agent believes he or she initiates, with intent, some causal chains (and, with purpose, redirects others), and therefore is the source of some effects, and therefore is responsible for his or her choices and acts extending out from those choices.









*"Human agency is the capacity for human beings to make choices. It is normally contrasted to natural forces, which are causes involving only unthinking deterministic processes. In this respect, agency is subtly distinct from the concept of free will, the philosophical doctrine that our choices are not the product of causal chains, but are significantly free or undetermined. Human agency entails the claim that humans do in fact make decisions and enact them on the world. How humans come to make decisions, by free choice or other processes, is another issue."

[Ned]

"How humans come to make decisions, by free choice or other processes, is another issue."

Indeed.