RE: Is Moral Responsibility Compatible With Determinism?
May 28, 2019 at 8:30 pm
(This post was last modified: May 28, 2019 at 8:32 pm by vulcanlogician.)
No. It isn't compatible.
But you can still do ethics and/or be a moral realist as a determinist/hard incompatibilist. The notion that some states of affairs or actions are good and others bad does not disappear with the notion of free will.
A determinist is guided less to punish bad behavior and more to prevent its causes... because (to a determinist) free choice ISN'T the cause of x behavior. It was exterior factors that made such and such a person do x.
The matter of free will is hardly settled. But incompatibilism has its benefits. Having a deterministic worldview is not only extremely logical, it can help you to overcome "moral anger." Sometimes, we are prone to think that "such and such deserves our wrath" when they do things that harm us. A determinist is able to stand back and look at the whole picture. Sure, a wrong was committed. But it is senseless to get angry over it. It is better to proceed logically through the situation, understanding that there were exterior causes leading the person to do what they did. The most fruitive activity then is to prevent further harm to oneself and others--not anger or revenge.
As Baruch Spinoza puts it:
But you can still do ethics and/or be a moral realist as a determinist/hard incompatibilist. The notion that some states of affairs or actions are good and others bad does not disappear with the notion of free will.
A determinist is guided less to punish bad behavior and more to prevent its causes... because (to a determinist) free choice ISN'T the cause of x behavior. It was exterior factors that made such and such a person do x.
The matter of free will is hardly settled. But incompatibilism has its benefits. Having a deterministic worldview is not only extremely logical, it can help you to overcome "moral anger." Sometimes, we are prone to think that "such and such deserves our wrath" when they do things that harm us. A determinist is able to stand back and look at the whole picture. Sure, a wrong was committed. But it is senseless to get angry over it. It is better to proceed logically through the situation, understanding that there were exterior causes leading the person to do what they did. The most fruitive activity then is to prevent further harm to oneself and others--not anger or revenge.
As Baruch Spinoza puts it:
Quote:I have laboured carefully, not to mock, lament, or execrate human actions, but to understand them; and, to this end, I have looked upon passions, such as love, hatred, anger, envy, ambition, pity, and the other perturbations of the mind, not in the light of vices of human nature, but as properties, just as pertinent to it, as are heat, cold, storm, thunder, and the like to the nature of the atmosphere, which phenomena, though inconvenient, are yet necessary, and have fixed causes, by means of which we endeavour to understand their nature, and the mind has just as much pleasure in viewing them aright, as in knowing such things as flatter the senses.
