Morality in Nature

[bennyboy]

Unless there's a magical morality floating in the heavens, then morality, decisions, behaviors, world view, etc. are all processes.

Wrong. A process indicates a series of actions. The word doesn't apply to sets of principles or ideas like morality, worldview etc.

Sure it does. Those principles are ideas, which can exist only in the brain, right? The are developed and held by brain function, right? It is the behavior (by the brain) resulting from those principles (in the brain) that are seen as moral or immoral, and punished, right?

The narrative as I believe you have it is that a person is born a product of his DNA and his environment (starting in the womb). Each experience he has results in brain activity, including learning. Then when a person decides to behave immorally (whatever that is taken to mean), it's because of a deterministic interaction between his internal environment (hormones, brain state, etc.) and his external environment (people calling him stupid or something).

You are ignoring a significant third aspect - the person himself. When you talk about his external environment and his internal environment, you are assuming the existence of something that can be identified as him. This identity is not equated to internal environment and is involved in the interaction.

Right. The PROCESS of interaction.

In the deterministic view, it is inevitable that a killer should kill. Given his brain state (which follows a deterministic chain right back to the womb), and his particular environment, he could not have done anything but kill.

And given that the brain state is "him" and the brain state controls the subsequent actions, he, thus bears the responsibility for those actions.

. . . which since determinism, he really has no control over. His awareness of his actions isn't truly volitional, it's as a happenstance bystander of brain function. Don't make me quote you saying just that maybe a dozen times.

So the killer is punished not for something he could control (i.e. a moral failing). He is punished for the way his brain processes information and forms behaviors. In fact, he HIMSELF is nothing but a collection of processes.

And they're being punished.

What makes you think that it was something he "could not control"? The role of an agent in a deterministic causal chain isn't disregarded so simply.

Stop using my arguments for the importance of mind against me. Are you now asserting that there is a ghost in the gears which somehow transcends determinism?

Either the person could really have acted differently, or he could not. If he could have, then no determinism. If he could not have, then no fair blaming him for murdering or raping.

[genkaus]

Sure it does. Those principles are ideas, which can exist only in the brain, right? The are developed and held by brain function, right? It is the behavior (by the brain) resulting from those principles (in the brain) that are seen as moral or immoral, and punished, right?

Are you getting confused?
Something being developed and held by brain function doesn't make it a process.

Let me make it simpler - there is data and there is process. When I write down a program in the computer, that program does not automatically become a process. It is a data about how a process is to be executed and it requires a processing software to turn it into a process.

Similarly, you morality, worldview etc. are data generated in your mind by years of learning and evaluating etc. and it is used to guide the process of behavior. That doesn't make it a process in itself.

You are ignoring a significant third aspect - the person himself. When you talk about his external environment and his internal environment, you are assuming the existence of something that can be identified as him. This identity is not equated to internal environment and is involved in the interaction.

Right. The PROCESS of interaction.

You seem even more confused. Ofcourse the entity's interaction is a process - but that interaction is not morality.

. . . which since determinism, he really has no control over. His awareness of his actions isn't truly volitional, it's as a happenstance bystander of brain function. Don't make me quote you saying just that maybe a dozen times.

That's where you are wrong. Given that he is a part of the chain, he has control over the events he causes. The "happenstance bystander" argument works only if you see "him" as something separate and uninvolved in deterministic causation.

Stop using my arguments for the importance of mind against me. Are you now asserting that there is a ghost in the gears which somehow transcends determinism?

There doesn't need to be a ghost. The machine is sufficient.

Either the person could really have acted differently, or he could not. If he could have, then no determinism. If he could not have, then no fair blaming him for murdering or raping.

But that's a false dichotomy. He could've acted differently - if he was a different person. Your error is the assumption that "he" exists separately from the deterministic causal chain - a bystander watching his life play out without any control over it - whereas, in fact, "he", his will and his volition are very much a part of that deterministic causation.

[bennyboy]

Something being developed and held by brain function doesn't make it a process.

Sure it does. Every time that idea or data is accessed (i.e. any time it affects any part of a person's thinking or behavior), there is active functioning. There is no passive data in the brain.

But that's a false dichotomy. He could've acted differently - if he was a different person. Your error is the assumption that "he" exists separately from the deterministic causal chain - a bystander watching his life play out without any control over it - whereas, in fact, "he", his will and his volition are very much a part of that deterministic causation.

We don't punish people based on abstracts. We punish them based on behaviors, i.e. the process of translating the environment through moral (and other) ideas and outputting a behavior. Now, since you claim that the behavior is inevitable FOR THAT PERSON, he could not have done other than he did.

If this punishment is an attempt at conditioning, okay. If it is moral retribution, then it is unsupportable.

[genkaus]

Sure it does. Every time that idea or data is accessed (i.e. any time it affects any part of a person's thinking or behavior), there is active functioning. There is no passive data in the brain.

There is passive data in brain. A lot of memories, knowledge and ideas that are not accessed and therefore are not a part of active functioning. Further evidence that the process of accessing data does not make the data a process.

We don't punish people based on abstracts. We punish them based on behaviors, i.e. the process of translating the environment through moral (and other) ideas and outputting a behavior. Now, since you claim that the behavior is inevitable FOR THAT PERSON, he could not have done other than he did.

If this punishment is an attempt at conditioning, okay. If it is moral retribution, then it is unsupportable.

On the contrary, we do punish people based on abstracts. All ideas, principles, morals, laws and rules are abstractions. It is only when their behavior does not measure up to an abstract standard that they are punished. The process you indicated assumes a set of abstract principles as the core. And given that that set of principles is not inevitable for the person, the consequent behavior is not inevitable either. Thus, since the behavior is not inevitable for that person, he could have done other than he did.

[bennyboy]

Sure it does. Every time that idea or data is accessed (i.e. any time it affects any part of a person's thinking or behavior), there is active functioning. There is no passive data in the brain.

There is passive data in brain. A lot of memories, knowledge and ideas that are not accessed and therefore are not a part of active functioning. Further evidence that the process of accessing data does not make the data a process.

At the time of access, it ceases to be passive. The neurons which encode the data fire up, send signals to other parts of the brain, and affect behavior. That's a process.

We don't punish people based on abstracts. We punish them based on behaviors, i.e. the process of translating the environment through moral (and other) ideas and outputting a behavior. Now, since you claim that the behavior is inevitable FOR THAT PERSON, he could not have done other than he did.

If this punishment is an attempt at conditioning, okay. If it is moral retribution, then it is unsupportable.

On the contrary, we do punish people based on abstracts. All ideas, principles, morals, laws and rules are abstractions. It is only when their behavior does not measure up to an abstract standard that they are punished.

I'm not talking about the mores of the judges. I'm talking about the immoral behavior of the person being judged. We don't care what evil ideas he holds-- so long as he shits once a day, eats three times a day, sleeps normal hours, and goes to church on Sunday, he's a swell guy. We don't care HOW he arrives at his good behavior-- so long as he doesn't start raping kids, killing moms, or voting Democrat.

The process you indicated assumes a set of abstract principles as the core. And given that that set of principles is not inevitable for the person, the consequent behavior is not inevitable either. Thus, since the behavior is not inevitable for that person, he could have done other than he did.

Why would you give that that set of principles is not inevitable for the person? At what point in the person's life, in a deterministic view, did he have a chance to learn other than he learned, feel other than he felt, and form other than the ideas he has formed?

This is special pleading: "Everything follows from a deterministic interaction between particles in the universe. Except that serial killing bastard-- HE has to fry, because he should have (magically) caused himself to turn out other than he did."

You are desperately hanging onto the concept of free will, while you insist on a model of the universe with which it is incompatible.

[max-greece]

But in a deterministic view he has no choice but to commit the crime and society has no choice but to punish him for it.

The net effect of determinism/free will is nil.

[bennyboy]

But in a deterministic view he has no choice but to commit the crime and society has no choice but to punish him for it.

The net effect of determinism/free will is nil.

Or maybe the deterministic society will deterministically arrive at the obvious conclusion that people can't be punished for crimes they could not have avoided committing.

[Neo-Scholastic]

And you, Benny, cling to a concept of determinism based on 18th century physics, based on mechanism and absolute time.

[Walking Void]

Time is linear and relative.

When You look at stars, You see the past, clearly.

When people look at You, You are the present and future, but people still see You as the past.

Special and general relativity. The speed of light being finite, it is a very beautiful thing.

[bennyboy]

And you, Benny, cling to a concept of determinism based on 18th century physics, based on mechanism and absolute time.

. . . and I'm not even a determinist. 'amember me from before, not?