Morality in Nature

[genkaus]

How do you know a person is aware? I think you're moving the goalposts here. Since you keep making words mean what they don't mean, I need your most precise definition of awareness to continue with this discussion. My prediction is that you'll give a definition, I'll show how something meets that definition, and you'll start piling on extra criteria. I have good evidence for supposing this prediction to be likely to come true.

You can find my definition of the terms in the first line of Wikipedia entries about them.

Awareness - Awareness is the state or ability to perceive, to feel, or to be conscious of events, objects, or sensory patterns.

Self-awareness - Self-awareness is the capacity for introspection and the ability to recognize oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals.

For definitions of rest of the terms used, look up their respective Wikipedia entries.

The definition, however, does not tell you how to ascertain the existence of these functions.

First of all, baloney. Killers in the states are constantly sent to death row, when seeing 5 seconds of an interview would show they should have been in an institution, not walking among free people.

An error in practice does not disprove the principle. If the mental capacity of the party is compromised, then he cannot be held liable for his actions. Establishing the compromise is a different matter altogether.

Second, what if the person's psychology is shattered by watching his mother and sister's heads get blown off by a cruise missile intended for a distant uncle? What if he was the victim of serious child abuse? What if he's been brainwashed? What if he's exposed to an insufficient diet, so that his brain isn't functioning normally? What if he's addicted to drugs at a young age, and the drugs destroy his ability to respond to social cues, or to have the feelings of sympathy necessary for a moral view to function?

He is held accountable as he should be. Same in the second case - unless the abuse resulted in brain damage. Same in the third. The extent of compromise resulting from the diet would've to be ascertained before making the call. The extent of compromise resulting from the drugs would've have to be ascertained before making that call - however, having feelings of sympathy is not necessary for a moral view to function.

No he can't. A person willing to kill unnecessarily is not mentally healthy. Either he's received damage to his brain, or his world view has been broken. Either way, he couldn't have chosen to have the brain damage, or to have his world view broken. Even in the case of a total sociopathic killer, there's some kind of reason WHY he has the impulse to kill, and WHY he doesn't resist the impulse, which is beyond his control.

Wrong on multiple counts. A person can be mentally healthy and be willing to kill. I have no idea what you mean by a "broken" worldview - but it does not qualify for being mentally unhealthy. Depending upon what you mean by a broken world-view, I'd say a person can choose to have it broken. And in case of the sociopath, why'd you assume that resisting the impulse is beyond his control? It isn't.

And a killer can provide whatever reasons they want; I have reasons to kill about 20 people a day, but I don't-- because I'm mentally capable of restraining my impulses.

As is the killer - unless you can show that he isn't.

The specific examples aren't important. The point is that there are many cases in which due to a condition beyond a person's control, they may BEHAVE in ways that are normally considered immoral, but with no intention to do so. And ultimately, ALL people are like this-- you just have to go back farther to find that deterministic event that led to the resultant "crime."

That deterministic event that leads to the resultant crime is called "making a choice".