/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.11302329]

Why is he so stubborn regarding free will?

[Anonymous No.11302354]

he's not a scientist or a philosopher, much less a public intellectual

he's a book salesman

[Anonymous No.11302458]

>>11302354
first post accuracy

and by rightwing standards, he's a veritable Socrates, which is both laughable and worrying

[Anonymous No.11302664]

>>11302354
/thread

[Anonymous No.11302696]

>>11302329
I've watched him talk about this, and while I can't claim to have studied his full argument, it basically ended up sounding like this:
>free will doesn't exist in any scientific notion because I've defined it in such a way that the methods of science preclude its existence
It felt like semantics combined with dogmatic scientism. Any time someone else offered an alternative, but fully reasonable, definition of free will, he would just go "NOPE THAT'S NOT FREE WILL".

[Anonymous No.11302807]

>>11302458
rightwingers don't like him. nobody on the intelleckshal dork web is revered on the by rightwingers

"conservatives" on the other hand probably like him

[Anonymous No.11302829]

>>11302329
>another thread about le free will
kys brainlet

[Anonymous No.11302997]

>>11302329
you’re a preprogrammed biological machine, deal with it

[Anonymous No.11303018]

>>11302329

[Anonymous No.11303069]

In our universe you have deterministic processes and probabilistic processes, neither get you free will (by Sam’s definition of free will).

I think it’s more complicated than that, although I’ll concede that the more you look at free will the less ‘free’ it appears.

[Anonymous No.11303072]

>>11302696
Yeah and he always talks with confidence as if he can talk on the behalf of "people" on what they think they have when they say they have free will . As if it included anything as specific as his notion that one "could have chosen differently even if the whole universe, including one's brain, had been in exactly the same state down to every quark". Most people just have this strong but undefined feeling of free will where they feel they know what it is and that they have it but it is just taken as a basic concept not to be defined further. It's therefore not up to science say anything about it, unless defined further - but any such definition can't be authoritative in a way that science could settle the debate in general.

The problem is as much the naive folk understanding of what "determined" means. It intuitively sounds like fatalism, like our choices having no effect. Obviously such determinism wouldn't be compatible with what people think when they say they have free will. But the overly generic and vacuous sense of "determinism", where it's some perfect full description of the laws of the universe determining everything, that determinists actually use, does no such thing. Basically such laws would be just full description of what happens in the universe - of course it will also include the choices we will actually do. But hard determinists like to pretend that people understand when it's said that everything is determined, so they can say that people believe in incompatibilist free will.

[Anonymous No.11303197]

>>11303018
What's the tl;dr?

[Anonymous No.11303221]

>>11302329
because he's a faggot cocksucker that's got bills to pay

[Anonymous No.11303227]

>>11303197
tl;dr: not worth your tiem. or mien lol i srsly have a hard tiem understanding how people can unload so many fucking words on such a boring fucking idea that is nowhere close to how things really fucking are

[Anonymous No.11303251]

>>11302354
first post best post

[Anonymous No.11303259]

>>11303197
That is the tldr anon
http://esotericawakening.com/is-free-will-an-illusion

>>11303227
stfu psued you got no clue wtf the variables even are much less how to interpret them

[Anonymous No.11303262]

>>11303072
Libertrarian free will ("the ability to have done otherwise") doesn't exist, compatibilist free will does. Sam agrees with this. He embraces the libertrarian definition because it is much closer to what people think of when they say free will.
Imagine if you programmed a computer to display the color red when you press r and the color blue when you press b. A choice is really just picking between two options, so the computer is making a choice here, and said choice is just as determined as any choice you make. But would most people agree the computer is free like humans? Of course not. Most people intuitively think that there is a ghost in the machine for humans, that their choices are more than the consequence of previous causes. So I would argue that compatibilists redefine free will to from its colloquial definition.

[Anonymous No.11303270]

>>11303259
>stfu psued you got no clue wtf the variables even are much less how to interpret them
what variables? in life? in the universe?

[Anonymous No.11303273]

>>11303259
>>11303270
also fuck your schizo spam

[Anonymous No.11303286]

>>11302329
Because he's right

[Anonymous No.11303290]

>>11303286
he's a faggot

[Anonymous No.11303291]

>>11303290
T. Religious

[Anonymous No.11303292]

>>11303262
The computer just doesn't engage in the kind of complex deliberation of different possibilities nor does really have anything we'd demand of an agent making choices. Of course it isn't "free" in the way humans are.
There simply isn't colloquial definition of free will at all, just an ineffable rough understanding what it means. Only philosophers go about defining it. Compatibilists are no more *re*defining it than those who believe in contracausal free will.

[Anonymous No.11303293]

>>11303291
what the fuck are you? an atheist faggot?

[Anonymous No.11303294]

>>11303290
>faggot
Why the homophobia?

[Anonymous No.11303297]

>>11303294

[Anonymous No.11303301]

>>11303262
>>11303292
I would agree though that believe that people think they "could have done otherwise" when they "freely chose". But they don't necessarily imagine the same exact state for the universe down to every quark, including their minds, under the counterfactual scenarios where they did otherwise. They don't think about it that deeply. They just think they "could have done otherwise", whatever that means.

[Anonymous No.11303308]

>>11303297

[Anonymous No.11303309]

>>11303308

[Anonymous No.11303329]

>>11303293
>What the fuck why don't you believe in my ridiculous ancient desert myths
Ok brainlet

[Anonymous No.11303340]

>>11303329
i'm not religious but if you don't have some sort of relationship with god you're missing a vital component of emotional structure

[Anonymous No.11303344]

>>11303292
>The computer just doesn't engage in the kind of complex deliberation of different possibilities nor does really have anything we'd demand of an agent making choices. Of course it isn't "free" in the way humans are.
That's just a matter of complexity. Make it a simple program or a highly sophisticated AI, the argument works either way. It's analogous in the sense that a computer's output is the deterministic result of its input being run through its software, just like how you react to a given situation as a result of the information of said situation being run through your mind. Look, we already agree on determinism, my point is simply that people intuitively feel like there is a special ingredient to human minds that makes them exempt from determinism, and that idea is pretty much exactly what libertrarian free will is.
>There simply isn't colloquial definition of free will at all, just an ineffable rough understanding what it means.
Sure, most people don't have a specific definition for it, but they sure mean SOMETHING. That something is at the very least much closer to the libertrarian version than the compatibilist version.

[Anonymous No.11303353]

>>11303340
Prove it

[Anonymous No.11303369]

>>11303353
the prevalence of depression/misery in the first world

[Anonymous No.11303375]

>>11302354
>he's not a scientist
he literally has a PhD in neuroscience from UCLA. what have you got?

[Anonymous No.11303376]

>>11303344
>Make it a simple program or a highly sophisticated AI
but if you make it a highly sophisticated AI there's going to be a lot more disagreement whether it is free or not

>That something is at the very least much closer to the libertrarian version than the compatibilist version.
Is it really? Do people believe there's some sort of inherent chanciness in their decision? That's what incompatibilist definitions would seem to demand.

[Anonymous No.11303384]

>/sci/ believes in free will
worrying

[Anonymous No.11303385]

>>11303069
determinism, given our current understanding of quantum mechanics, is pants-on-head retarded.

[Anonymous No.11303387]

>>11303369
>Correlation = Causation
Brainlet detected

[Anonymous No.11303389]

>>11303369
Oh, you mean the first world where nearly 70% of people are still religious?

[Anonymous No.11303403]

>>11302354
>>11302458
>samefag
>plebbitfag

[Anonymous No.11303408]

>>11303389
It's interesting you know? You can be religious and not have a relationship with God, but you can not be religious and have a relationship with God. All that needs to be understood is that there are forces at play far beyond our reasoning. All we can do is pray for the power to not fuck up too bad in our short lives.

[Anonymous No.11303410]

>>11303376
I think the example of Charles Whitman is a pretty good one. He was the clocktower shooter who killed his mom and a bunch of other people. In his gooddbye letter he wrote about rages that overcame him. After his death, an autopsie revealed that they came from a tumor pressing on his amygdala.
When you tell people about him, as soon as you mention that his actions were the result of a brain tumor, there is a sense of "oh so he's not really evil, he's just a poor sap who happened to grow a tumor in the wrong place." But of course your actions are always the result of prior causes, wether those are genes, environment or indeed a tumor.
I think this example exposes that people don't think of the things that usually shape a human in the same way they think of the more obviously mind-shaping variables. Barely anyone feels sorry for regular serial killers for having the right combination of genes, parents or any number of other variables that made them who they are, even though they are ultimately just as much the up to luck.
So that's my point. Clearly people do think that there is a special ingredient in the human mind that usually makes them exempt from causality, because in a case like charles whitman, where the link between a cause and his behaviour is undeniably obvious, they view it much differently.

[Anonymous No.11303437]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eELfSwqJNKU

[Anonymous No.11303456]

>>11303408
>g_d
>there are forces at work beyond our reasoning
>all we can do is pray
You're on the wrong board.
>>>/x/

[Anonymous No.11303459]

>>11303456
you have no fucking idea how much i don't want to accept reality but i've been waiting too fucking long for science to bring me peace. i love science but at this point in my miserable fucking life i have to ask something from beyond to keep the spark of life in me lit

[Anonymous No.11303461]

>>11302329
define free will

[Anonymous No.11303464]

>>11303461
"the ability to have done otherwise"

[Anonymous No.11303479]

>>11303464
but you didn't for reasons. no free will

[Anonymous No.11303493]

>>11303456
>>g_d
The JIDF is paid to shit up >>>/pol/, go back there.

[Anonymous No.11303502]

>>11303493
oh no not muh gawd

[Anonymous No.11303506]

>>11303479
Based

[Anonymous No.11303512]

free will is such a retarded concept. There literaly is no debate if it exists because there isnt even a coherent definition of it. Closest argument for the existence of it is from Kant and its basically doubting that causality exists, which I don't find very convincing

[Anonymous No.11303522]

>>11303512
the general concept of it is pretty cut and dry. if we can know every part of a system we can perfectly predict every future action of said system. generally speaking, it works with newtonian phsyics, and it's how we do things like toss satellites in orbit or land on the moon. the idea of 100% certainty went out the window with quantum mechanics, though, and kant died long before that discovery, so anything he had to say about it is outdated either way.

[Anonymous No.11303529]

>>11303410
I think the tumor's a mitigating factor, possibly a huge one, but it doesn't completely remove moral responsibility necessarily. After all it still isn't literally the tumor alone that did all those murders. It's the combination of the tumor and the rest of his brain. So if you're telling people it was nothing but the result of the tumor I don't you're really telling the truth. Perhaps a person that had originally a very strong moral character might have been able to keep himself in control in spite of the tumor. So to some degree it was still a moral failing of his - by which I don't mean the rest of us can assume we'd be any better in his situation. There's the further dilemma of "moral luck" of being put to situations in the first place where there are moral challenges.

A similar situation would be where an otherwise moral person who is prone to violence under the influence of alcohol would commit acts of violence after somehow unwittingly consuming alcohol. We want to separate both a brain tumor and the effects of alcohol from a person's general personal identity, as these two temporary aspects can be pretty easily discerned from what he is in general. The tumor was more like a really tough challenge he was put through, rather than a real part of himself in any important sense. But it still wasn't a brain of its own that took complete control of his body, so to say there's clearly no responsibility whatsoever isn't right.

[Anonymous No.11303531]

>>11303522
>Kant
>outdated
yeah no

>the idea of 100% certainty went out the window with quantum mechanics,

Thats what Kant was arguing. We can't be 100% certain of causality, therefor free will "might" exist. Still not an argument that it must exist(same with quantum mechanics)

>the general concept of it is pretty cut and dry.

define it then

[Anonymous No.11303562]

>>11303410
>Barely anyone feels sorry for regular serial killers for having the right combination of genes, parents or any number of other variables that made them who they are, even though they are ultimately just as much the up to luck.

That's because there's nothing simple to extract from these people (as far as we know) that would take their "evil" nature away while maintaining who they are at all. This is why we can't say their deeds aren't their fault, because it's most likely a result of complex interaction of the features of these persons where you can't pinpoint to a distinctly "evil" part - it's a complex emergent result of it all and deeply rooted in what they are. With Whitman it's different. Whitman + brain tumor might have been a wicked person, but there's still easily discernable Whitman without the brain tumor that's distinct from this combination.

[Anonymous No.11303570]

>>11303410
>Barely anyone feels sorry for regular serial killers for having the right combination of genes, parents or any number of other variables that made them who they are, even though they are ultimately just as much the up to luck.

I do, I see crimes like that like an horrifying illness that affects at least 2 people and needs to be treated. I don't believe in revenge-justice or good/evil.

[Anonymous No.11303574]

>>11302329
Does Sam Harris believe in free will or not?
How does he define free will?
If he’s defining it as the ability to make choices that aren’t predetermined by past events and these choices aren’t random rather than chosen, then that free will doesn’t exist. It’s not physically possible.

[Anonymous No.11303581]

>>11303570
>I don't believe in revenge-justice

Pussy faggot. Rapists should be raped and murderers should be killed.

[Anonymous No.11303598]

>>11303410
Thinking about it more I'll concede that probably most people's immediate hunch is when realizing, or presented the idea that our choices are just a result of complex arrangement of atoms in our brains being in one state, causally resulting in other state, and this being further traceable to our genes and our environment etc. etc. is that this is incompatible with free will (it was certainly my immediate hunch as well when I first thought about the issue). But most people's immediate understanding of "determinism" is false as well, with all those incorrect fatalist assumptions about nothing they do mattering when it's all predetermined blah blah. So defining both of them according to popular immediate hunches, we have no free will but determinism is false as well (and it would be false even if we lived in a world of classical physics). I still think this apparent contracausal nature is not all there is to intuitive sense of free will, so while we don't have exactly what most people think as free will, it's not a good idea to tell people that they are just radically deluded in thinking they have it.

[Anonymous No.11303603]

>>11303375
I browse r/atheism and r/logic you dotard, which is filled with people who have many PhDs and higher IQs than you jeebus worshipping idiots

[Anonymous No.11303604]

>>11303581
I'm not even completely opposed against the death penalty. If someone is a danger to society they should be isolated, and if there is no chance to "cure" them it would sometimes be okay to eliminate them.
Altough I'm mostly against it because innocents could die and it doesn't seem to be a good deterrent.

Also whats the point of raping rapists? It doesnt unrape their victims. I think that kind of thinking is so childlike.

[Anonymous No.11303606]

>>11303531
Tbh even with quantum indeterminacy, free will is still incoherent.
If the universe was purely deterministic, then you'd just be a causality machine. But with some indeterminacy? Then you're just a causality machine that throws a couple of dice occasionally.
If your will is indetermined, then it's literally coming out of nowhere, so you're still not the author of your will. Wether your will is determined, indetermined or some combination of the two, you're not getting the kind of freeness you're looking for.

[Anonymous No.11303613]

>>11303604
>Altough I'm mostly against it because innocents

Establish tighter epistemological standards for death penalty crimes.

>and it doesn't seem to be a good deterrent.

Yeah, it could be much more brutal. I’d suggest killing wrongdoers by firing squad in some kind of public plaza, and leave the bodies out to rot for a few days. Maybe involve the public in the punishment by having them stone people or something along those lines, or turn people into public sex slaves.

> Also whats the point of raping rapists?

The pleasure and satisfaction of hurting someone who hurt you or others. Nothing makes my dick hard like seeing Nazi shitheads and serial killers writhe in pain. A Hell is unlikely so we ought to make every moment of their continued existence as painful as possible.

[Anonymous No.11303616]

>>11303606
>If your will is indetermined, then it's literally coming out of nowhere, so you're still not the author of your will. Wether your will is determined, indetermined or some combination of the two, you're not getting the kind of freeness you're looking for.

I agree but I would like to provide a counterpoint, based loosely on Kant(basically the eli5 version, its been years since I read it).

According to him causality is a state of mind and not neccesarily a property of reality. The proof is that we always assume every cause has an effect and every effect has a cause(similar to how we perceive everything as inhabiting space/time).
Since our minds are shaped in that way there is not way of telling how the thing in itself works outside of our minds.
Soooo technically there might be a third option between randomness and determinism and that could be free will.

As I said I don't think that this is a strong argument for free will to exist, however it opens up the possibility that it "might" exist.

[Anonymous No.11303621]

>>11303562
But that's just a matter of simplicity. Imagine if there were some pill you could give evil people to "cure" them of their evilness. If that were the case, then it would be obvious that any serial killer just suffers from the condition of evilness and it would simply be a tragic that we haven't found out and cured them earlier. Moreover, if we caught a serial killer, it would be ridiculous to withhold the cure as punishment.
Yes, the connection betwen causes and actions are usually much more complicated and numerous than in Whitmans case, but I'm pointing out that the distinction is arbitrary and the fact that people still make it demonstrates that implicitly they think of minds as not entirely causal, which is what I'm getting at.

[Anonymous No.11303622]

>>11303273
rofl you literally post gifs on this board in every thread and you call others schizo? That's rich anon, take your meds and take a nap

[Anonymous No.11303623]

>>11303613
>The pleasure and satisfaction of hurting someone who hurt you or others.

So basically you are basing this on your feels instead of logic and pragmatism. And I'm the pussy faggot?

>Yeah, it could be much more brutal. I’d suggest killing wrongdoers by firing squad in some kind of public plaza, and leave the bodies out to rot for a few days. Maybe involve the public in the punishment by having them stone people or something along those lines, or turn people into public sex slaves.

So you want to deterr people from raping by making rapes an socially accepted and public event. Got it makes sense. People do shit like that in third world shitholes and it doesn't work, it even makes it more common.

[Anonymous No.11303624]

>>11303270
Yes those variables

[Anonymous No.11303625]

>>11303570
I agree. Retributive justice makes no sense, although feelings of retribution are underatandable if you've been wronged, even if they're not rationally justifiable.

[Anonymous No.11303627]

>>11303456
stfu psued you are not the gatekeeper of this board you autistic sperg lord. What kind of complex do you have to have to think you are the arbiter of what people post on an open forum? Jesus get some meds and get a life you little weirdo

[Anonymous No.11303633]

>>11303623
>So basically you are basing this on your feels instead of logic and pragmatism.

Moral convictions are based on “feelings”, not logic and pragmatism. Basing moral convictions on “logic and pragmatism” is outright impossible as trying to do so commits the is-ought fallacy.

[Anonymous No.11303644]

>>11303623
>So you want to deterr people from raping by making rapes an socially accepted and public event. Got it makes sense.

Yep. The more brutalistic, openly apparent, and swift punishment for wrongdoing is, the less likely people are to do wrong, at least in theory. People can bleed off their lust for sex and violence by engaging in public punishment of criminals.

> People do shit like that in third world shitholes and it doesn't work, it even makes it more common.

Prove it. Correlations don’t equate to causation.

[Anonymous No.11303647]

>>11303625
>even if they're not rationally justifiable.

Ethics aren’t rationally justifiable from the bottom up.

[Anonymous No.11303676]

>>11302329
Free will is probably the least interesting topic in philosophy. Even if every event in the universe is part of a chain of causality that was never going to happen any other way, who the fuck cares?

Humans still have to make choices, and so do other animals. And these animals, including humans, have the capacity to LEARN from our mistakes, and make better decisions after this learning process. Even if everything in the universe is caused, including our own actions, it doesn't make the learning process less real. And it doesn't really make our choices less real either.

Humans can absolutely entertain several possible courses of action, then choose a course of action. Then afterwards we have the ability to reflect, and think about whether our course of action was a good one, in comparison to other courses of action we could have taken. Even IF the universe is entirely determined (which isn't even certain given that, in quantum physics, some events are only likely to happen, rather than certain to happen), that doesn't change the very real decision-making process that humans (and other animals) use. We entertain certain courses of action, we pick one, we learn from it, we reflect on what else we could have done. If we chose NOT to reflect on our decisions like this, our decision-making would be worse.

In my view, the only way that "free will" is an interesting topic is in an entirely different sense of the phrase "free will". And that's in the sense of being free from impediments, like bullying, control or manipulation by others, government repression, things like that.

[Anonymous No.11303690]

>>11303676
>Even if every event in the universe is part of a chain of causality that was never going to happen any other way, who the fuck cares?

Let’s be honest, the topic is only ever discussed because it has significance to theology, which is also utterly irrelevant.

[Anonymous No.11303708]

>>11303598
Well I pretty much agree with all if this. The only caviat I have is that understanding determinism has made me more empathetic and compassionate for people, so it's good for me, but you're probably right in assuming that most people would misunderstand it and just take it in a sort of nihilistc way.

[Anonymous No.11303714]

>>11302354
>>11302458
>>11302664
>>11303251
Why is this board so fucking dense?

[Anonymous No.11303720]

>>11303529
It’s not about morality or responsibility. We can recognize that these people have serious problems and be immoral while also understanding that they’re immoral outside of their control. That’s all

[Anonymous No.11303760]

>>11303720
The same can be said of any vile fucker. I don’t care, and would happily shoot them in the skull.

[Anonymous No.11303787]

>>11303622
At least i don't make incoherent post after incoherent post self-indulgently rambling about horseshit like esoteric awakening and electric universe

[Anonymous No.11303920]

>>11303714
should you trust a woman who isn't married and eats her own booger? I know I wouldnt

[Anonymous No.11303924]

morally speaking, the only difference between a mentally ill person with a huge mass on his frontal lobe and a street murderer is the distance of causality i.e. the information
why aren't you mad at someone at the other end of the world who caused a butterfly effect that led to the death of your family? you simply can't muster the emotional and brainpower to comprehend the immensity of the causalities involved

[Anonymous No.11303927]

>>11303385
Probabilisism, given our current understanding of general relativity, is pants-on-head retarded.

[Anonymous No.11303933]

since many of of you are scientists lets play a game of induction
the base case:
a person commits a crime but is found to be controlled by an evil wizard
we can fully justify that the person is not immoral, he is simply not in control of himself
induction:
any wizard A is controlled by another evil wizard A + 1
who is at fault here?

[Anonymous No.11303936]

>>11303924
that's because decision makers can't take something like butterfly effect into account and condemning them for not doing this won't change anything. meanwhile social condemnation or punishment can change certain kind of undesirable behaviors

[Anonymous No.11303942]

>>11303936
>meanwhile social condemnation or punishment can change certain kind of undesirable behaviors
i fully agree and Sam does too
he is simply asking us to be practical and consistent
the problem is when deciding what have to be done for social issues we often put down rationality and let emotions take over
if we have a cure for evil, it would be immoral to bar this cure for the Nazis or the serial killer because it simply is impractical, why would you prevent it? because he ""deserve"" the jail time?
social issues have deep roots, but we often take any bloke out there to be the center of all causality

[Anonymous No.11303978]

>>11303933
Why are you constructing a nonsensical example which does not and cannot happen in reality? Is it because you're a moron?

[Anonymous No.11303979]

>>11303942
well such a cure is pretty speculative. maybe if we had such a thing we shouldn't punish anyone for behavior we could simply cure with that. but anger and moral indignation are probably useful in mean time - i don't know if sam harris disagrees with that, i hope not for that would make him quite a hypocrite (he is full of anger and moral indignation towards Trump).

[Anonymous No.11304000]

>>11303633
>Basing moral convictions on “logic and pragmatism” is outright impossible as trying to do so commits the is-ought fallacy.

Except I'm not talking about morals. The question is how you can minimize rapes/crime. Thats a question that should be answered by logic and not feels.

[Anonymous No.11304001]

>>11303933
the last wizard is at fault

[Anonymous No.11304010]

>>11302354
he's still correct

[Anonymous No.11304023]

>>11303292
>The computer just doesn't engage in the kind of complex deliberation of different possibilities
It could if you added a script to do just that. Doesn't change anything.
Not to mention, none of these "deliberations" nd thoughts are free, they just come to you as externally (out of your control) as anything.

[Anonymous No.11304039]

>>11304023
define "control"

also read >>11303676
he's talking about the kind of agency and choice that is compatible with determinism. clearly it is also possible to lack this kind of agency, or at least have it radically diminished (take severely mentally handicapped people), and clearly there are actions that are not freely willed even in a compatibilist sense (let's say some compulsory motion due to some disorder). So these kind of details can matter, while being fully compatible with causality and determinism.

[Anonymous No.11304041]

>>11304000
>The question is how you can minimize rapes/crime.

Okay, let’s work it out.
The vast majority of inmates are arrested for a new crime within ten years of their release, 83%. As an example, 70% of robbers are re-arrested within three years of release.
So how could we minimize crime?

KILL THEM.

[Anonymous No.11304056]

>>11304041
Singapore and Indonesia have death penalty for drug dealing, which is considered less harmful than robbery in the West. Indonesia is a extremely poor country with fairly low crime rates. Do you have a problem with that?

[Anonymous No.11304064]

>>11304056
>Singapore and Indonesia have death penalty for drug dealing, which is considered less harmful than robbery in the West

Legalize all drugs. I have no problem with informal exchanges of goods and services.

[Anonymous No.11304083]

>>11302458
Holy shit you're off base.
Is this how jews really view the "right wing"?

[Anonymous No.11304084]

>>11304023
>they just come to you as externally (out of your control) as anything.
those thoughts are controlled by the decision making algorithm in my brain. how would that be out of my control? that's a very much a part of who i am. this is why incompatibilist determinists sound like dualists to me. they talk as if we are some souls helplessly pushed around by laws of physics, rather than ourselves being a part of physics.

[Anonymous No.11304091]

>>11304064
>I have no problem with
read: its morals are subjectively neutral to you
Laws shouldn't concern themselves with morality but with effectiveness in maximizing welfare.

[Anonymous No.11304101]

>>11304084
>those thoughts are controlled by the decision making algorithm in my brain.
Does a computer have free will? Just because an algorithm is complex doesn't mean it's magically any less or any more free. A computer is just a calculator, and our brains are just calculators, only "more complex".

[Anonymous No.11304103]

>>11304091
>Laws shouldn't concern themselves with morality but with effectiveness in maximizing welfare.

Why ought we maximize welfare? You’re way to pretend laws aren’t just imposed morals is to assume utilitarianism and pretend it’s not a moral system. Brilliant.

[Anonymous No.11304123]

>>11303340
>i'm not a faggot i'm just curious

[Anonymous No.11304148]

>>11303385
Our current understanding of quantum mechanics doesn't leave any room for will, it just opens the possibility that our will-less universe may be random rather than determined.

[Anonymous No.11304203]

>>11304101
>Does a computer have free will?
Are five grains of sand a sand heap? Are viruses a form of life? Were the spirits and deities postulated by our hunter-gather ancestors to explain natural phenomena scientific theories? It's that kind of question. It's not a simple either or, there are degrees of free will. A computer can be said to be making decisions in some sense, but it doesn't have the kind of free will we have.

[Anonymous No.11304206]

>>11304203
>but it doesn't have the kind of free will we have.

We have no free will.

[Anonymous No.11304207]

>>11304203
>A computer can be said to be making decisions in some sense, but it doesn't have the kind of free will we have.
and that's obviously talking about computers of today. In the future we could in principle have artificial intelligences that had just as much and just the kind of free will we humans have.

[Anonymous No.11304227]

>>11304206
We have the kind of agency and very real decision making as described eloquently in >>11303676. He isn't even keen on calling it free will, but I think it encompasses a lot of what people associate with free will. There are some nonsensical things that people might associate with it as well. The important thing is not to get hung on the word, but distinguish the parts that make sense from the ones that don't, and not throw away the sensible ones with the nonsensical ones. That's why I'm opposed to blunt assertions that we have no free will.

[Anonymous No.11304231]

>>11303410
Normalcattle are willing to accept deterministic exceptions, but never the rule. It would debase everything in their life. Dash out their virtues, absolve their villains, and take away their most favourite of all activities: blaming.

[Anonymous No.11304256]

The very concept of free will proves its existence. It cannot be an “illusion”. An illusion of what? An illusion is something that falsely appears to be something else, but the thing it that appears to be must obviously exist in the first place for it to be imitated. Consciousness provides free will and neither are physical “illusions”.

[Anonymous No.11304298]

>>11303676
>every event in the universe is part of a chain of causality that was never going to happen any other way
>it doesn't make the learning process less real
>it doesn't really make our choices less real either.

>Your point can't be outright denied with a straight face, so I'll just make the bare minimum concession then go on acting as if it is not true at all.

[Anonymous No.11304302]

>>11304227
We make decisions but those decisions are predetermined physically ignoring possible quantum randomness

[Anonymous No.11304305]

>>11304256
The very concept of leprechauns prove their existence. They cannot be an “illusion”. An illusion of what? An illusion is something that falsely appears to be something else, but the thing it that appears to be must obviously exist in the first place for it to be imitated.

[Anonymous No.11304313]

>>11303933
man shakes fist at cloud dot png

[Anonymous No.11304329]

>>11304302
We don't make decisions, we just think we make decisions. That we think we make decisions is pre-determined, as is every action we make.

[Anonymous No.11304332]

>>11304329
>We don't make decisions, we just think we make decisions.

Yes.

[Anonymous No.11304334]

>>11304302
Yes and causal determination is precisely what makes those decisions ours. Random quantum fluctuation isn't a part of what we are in any important way, while our thoughts, feelings, memories, metal capabilities that together cause our actions very much are.

[Anonymous No.11304340]

>>11304329
>We don't make decisions
Yes we do, we consider different options and weigh them according to our values, thoughts, all those properties that make us what we are, and this result in our choice. That's what deciding is.

[Anonymous No.11304355]

>>11304340
Our values, thoughts, and all properties that make us what we are are entirely determined by a string of past events, there was not a single 'choice' that every influenced them in any way because there is no such thing as choice. Every action and process is ultimately pre-determined, including the experience in which we feel as if we are weighing up options.

[Anonymous No.11304362]

>>11302354
>he's not a scientist or a philosopher, much less a public intellectual
>he's a book salesman

[Anonymous No.11304366]

>>11303978
replace wizard with causality or physics

[Anonymous No.11304368]

>>11304340
>Yes we do, we consider different options and weigh them according to our values, thoughts, all those properties that make us what we are, and this result in our choice. That's what deciding is.

Did you decide who your parents would be?
Did you decide what genetic composition to get from them?
Did you decide what values they would emphasize while raising you?
Did you decide in which environment to grow up?
Did you decide on your teachers in school?
Did you decide what people would be in your class?

>What would you guess how much of your (You) is basically determined by these factors?

[Anonymous No.11304387]

>>11304355
>Our values, thoughts, and all properties that make us what we are are entirely determined by a string of past events
sure
>there was not a single 'choice' that every influenced them in any way because there is no such thing as choice
and by what fucktarded definiton of "choice" is this true? do you seriously go throw your life without thinking terms of choice, possibilities, reflecting what you could have done otherwise, simulating counterfactuals, holding people responsible for some things and not for others? if a concept is indispensable for basic functioning then it's pretty damn real.

>>11304368
and? Sure, I didn't poof out of thin air, there are reasons for why I am the way I am. I don't see how that should result in throwing away the concept of "choice". This is completing missing the point of what the concept is for.

[Anonymous No.11304388]

>>11304387
>This is completing missing the point of what the concept is for.
*completely

[Anonymous No.11304415]

>>11304387
>do you seriously go throw your life without thinking terms of choice, possibilities, reflecting what you could have done otherwise, simulating counterfactuals, holding people responsible for some things and not for others? if a concept is indispensable for basic functioning then it's pretty damn real.

>choice
I am pre-determined to feel like I am making them, and pre-determined to feel as if I could choose otherwise, but in reality I cannot.
>possibilities
I am pre-determined to feel like there are possibilities other than that which happens, but in reality there is not.
>reflecting what you could have done otherwise
Whether I reflect, and in which ways I reflect, and the conclusions of those reflections are all pre-determined.
>holding people responsible
Whether anyone should or should not be held responsible is beside the point. Maybe they should or maybe they shouldn't, but in either case whether we do or do not hold them responsible is pre-determined.
>basic functioning
We function automatically and inevitably, just like animals, plants, and cells. Whether we do or do not function at any moment is pre-determined by a chain of physical and cosmic causality, and if we do function then the manner in which we function is also pre-determined.

I am not saying that you don't feel and experience the process of choosing, I am saying it was always and inevitably pre-determined that the creature that is you, in the exact form it is in now, would come to be at this point in time, and that your feelings and experiences of being a chooser with choices is also pre-determined, and what you end up thinking, deciding, and actioning is also pre-determined, and that the feeling of being able to choose is a complete illusion, and that this illusion occurring in the exact manner it is occurring is also pre-determined.

[Anonymous No.11304427]

He triggers libs because believes thoughts influence actions and believes in evolution to the fullest. Aka a race realist.

He triggers cons because he believes god is nonsense and believes in evolution of ape to man. Aldo promotes antitheist and scientific way of looking at morals.

He's doing something right.

[Anonymous No.11304433]

>>11304427
He accepts the scientific basis of race realism but for some reason goes on to say "but why talk about it at all" just because it makes him feel icky, even though it is so obviously consequential in a massive way.

[Anonymous No.11304445]

>>11304433
>"but why talk about it at all" just because it makes him feel icky, even though it is so obviously consequential in a massive way.

Yeah we should enable literal Nazis by giving the disproven science of racialism any attention.
It won’t matter because the supposed “races” are all dissolving into one. Thank God.