(April 25, 2011 at 10:26 pm)padraic Wrote: That principle is well know by lawyers, of Judges. It's called 'the bacon and egg rule' and refers to what kind of breakfast a judge had.
It's similar sure, but nowhere near as much of a problem in that situation as a Judge largely has established legal precedent to work from where as a parole boards has guidelines but a large portion of their decision is entirely based on their own subjective value determinations and moral judgements.
I'm for using Statistical Prediction Rules (SPRs) rather than parole boards, their efficacy in determining what people to give parole to is much better than parole boards.
Quote:I'm not sure I understand your full post.. I accept that psychological egoism is the the basis of morality.
I was just listing some of the most non-intuitive scientific findings regarding how our moral judgements operate.
The basis of morality? No. It has a contribution to our individual values but morality is an evaluation of conflicting values, our own moral judgements are a product of our values, but a metaethical framework doesn't depend on them.
Quote:You also seem to be taking a determinist line and denying rational thinking as a significant agent in decision making (?)
There is nothing about determinism that denies deliberation (which aren't necessarily rational) as a significant factor in our Utilitarian/Consequentialst judgements, but it has less to do with our reactionary and more "absolute" deontological judgements.
On the contrary, determinism makes morality possible, in a deterministic universe we can use our moral tools of praise and condemnation to influence the desires and beliefs a person has so their values are less likely to be conflicting, unlike an in-determinist universe where our praise and condemnation has no means by which to effect the ethereal "self" (or sould) that non-naturalists claim is responsible for our moral judgements.
Quote:If so,I agree. My perception is that in reality, human beings are self deluding animals. We are incapable of consistent rational thought. What we call free will is mostly (or entirely) an illusion. Our actions are predetermined by experience,genetic inheritance and hard wired instinct.
Yeah I agree with most of that, and I reject free will outright, I don't consider Compatiblism to be anything more than a way of appealing to proponents of "free will" who are scared by the thought of determinism, deliberation in a deterministic universe is all we need.
We aren't so much "self deluding" as it is a case of our brain being a flawed lens through which we see the world, we have evolved quirks that contribute to our perception. Luckily our brain is, as Eliezer Yudkowsky puts it, a flawed lens than can see it's flaws.
Quote:BUT I FEEL and believe on a visceral level that I have free will and I FEEL as if I'm being rational,say as I write this. In any practical sense,both beliefs are true for me. Does that make any sense at all?>
I get where you're coming from because I once thought the same, but once I got to understand more of our brains functionality I no longer feel as if I have free will, I feel like a fully caused being with the ability to deliberate prior to action - It feels exactly the same as when I thought I had free will, but what I feel isn't free will, and knowing that I can't rightly say that what I feel is that I have free will.
Rationality is an entirely different ballpark, we are often but not always rational, the key to becoming more rational is in my view taking into account the flaws of our lens (our biases, intuitions etc) and compensating for them, using what we know objectively about the function of our brain from cognitive sciences as a corrective measure.
Using language in a way that another person can comprehend is, for instance, by it's very nature a rational activity.
.
