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#81
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07-10-2017, 12:24 PM
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| My Rank: GUNNERY SERGEANT Poster Rank:697 Male Join Date: Jun 2010 Posts: 1,219 Mentioned: 2 Post(s) Quoted: 257 Post(s)
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Re: Russian Solders (maybe?) Beat ISIS Guy with Sledge Hammer
I've heard of ISIS. Have you heard of the problem of free will? For those not wanting to having uncomfortable feelings by having their worldview challenged or can't read for more than about 3 minutes please disregard the rest of this post. For those who wan't to know the problem keep reading. Thanks. If you can ascribe reasons to the things that you do, then you are drawing that line of determination from variable A to variable B: one thing causes another. This is how scientists analyze things, but you don’t have to be a scientist to do it. You just ask: “How did I feel, what did I think, and what were the factors that went into deciding what I decided?” Scientists can do this in a great deal of detail. Rigorous theories of behavior usually ascribe our feelings and actions to a complex web of interacting causes, at any number of different levels: social causes, psychological causes and neurophysiological causes all can interact with one another. But whether the reason is simple, or a complex dynamic interacting web of factors, in the end there is a reason you wanted the thing you wanted, and a reason you made the choice that you made. And once you identify the reason, you have eliminated “free will” from the equation: you have figured out, instead, that there is a cause, or a thing (or set of things) that determined your choice. Your only other option is to say, “There was no reason!” which means that you behaved randomly. Randomness is also not “free will”. It shows that the only reason we even have an illusion of free will is that we aren’t conscious of the causes behind the decisions we make. It’s a compelling illusion, to be sure. But an illusion, just the same. People badly want to believe that they have some measure of "control" over their own lives. The free will skeptic understands that not only is "control" something we don't have, it's an incoherent concept. It's not a complete idea- it's the crumbled bedrock of vain desire and contradiction. You can't push a door before you push it. You can't push a door before your physical body pushes the door. You won't physically push the door until a mechanical process within your body occurs. That process won't occur until it's triggered to occur by the brain. A conscious thought (which is also caused by a process of antecedent events) may precede the brain's transmission of the signal to start the process. If not, no conscious thought preceded the transmission of the signal. In either case, no "control" and no free will. How is it meaningful to say one "chose" to open the door, in a manner that justifies the desserts sense of responsibility and re-affirms the sense of 'control' people want to have and think they do have? It's not about words. It's about ideas. People think they can do something that is a malformed idea, and this widespread belief is the primary reason why otherwise empathetic and caring people sometimes blame and punish wrongdoers in a harsh and nonsensical fashion. |
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#84
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07-11-2017, 12:15 AM
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 ]~Resident Asshole~[ Poster Rank:295 Stands to Pee Join Date: Aug 2009 Posts: 4,333 Mentioned: 12 Post(s) Quoted: 2203 Post(s)
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Re: Russian Solders (maybe?) Beat ISIS Guy with Sledge Hammer
Torture as horrific as it is, does fill a certain need in society. As would-be serial killers attempt to shock the world in more depraved and vicious attacks, I think there should always be consequences in line with the cruelty of the criminal. I firmly believe the surviving family should have more say in trials of these monsters. Some are worried the guy getting hammered was being wronged. However, these are the guys who shot fleeing families in Mosul or in Syria. What if he truly deserves what he is getting
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#89
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07-13-2017, 11:01 AM
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| My Rank: GUNNERY SERGEANT Poster Rank:697 Male Join Date: Jun 2010 Posts: 1,219 Mentioned: 2 Post(s) Quoted: 257 Post(s)
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Re: Russian Solders (maybe?) Beat ISIS Guy with Sledge Hammer
You can believe it, but that doesn't make it true. Statistics show that the death penalty leads to a brutalisation of society and an increase in murder rate. In the USA, more murders take place in states where capital punishment is allowed. In 2010, the murder rate in states where the death penalty has been abolished was 4.01 per cent per 100,000 people. In states where the death penalty is used, the figure was 5.00 per cent. These calculations are based on figures from the FBI. The gap between death penalty states and non-death penalty states rose considerably from 4 per cent difference in 1990 to 25 per cent in 2010. All ways of executing people cause so much suffering to the condemned person that they amount to torture and are wrong. Many methods of execution are quite obviously likely to cause enormous suffering, such as execution by lethal gas, electrocution or strangulation. Other methods have been abandoned because they were thought to be barbaric, or because they forced the executioner to be too 'hands-on'. These include firing squads and beheading. The idea that we must be punished for any act of wrongdoing, whatever its nature, relies upon a belief in human free will and a person's ability to be responsible for their own actions. If one does not believe in free will, the question of whether it is moral to carry out any kind of punishment (and conversely reward) arises. |
