Congratulations! You are ZERO FOR TWO! <g>
1). You don't have a clue what I'm talking about, and
2). You don't have a clue what YOU'RE talking about!
"Dude, you're the material reductionist"
I've never said that. I have said that within a deterministic framework there is unpredictability in the strictly material realm, and there is the apparent freedom to choose in the conscious realm.
All matter reacts to other matter: even our brain synapses react to the bombardment of various stimuli through our sense organs. As soon as we term our reaction a RESPONSE we are acknowledging that choice was made between alternatives. Are these alternatives real or only apparent? I don't know. But in practice, it suggests that humans have a nature--an identity--capable of intention and action. The assumption of freedom to choose is implicit. Whether the human capacity to intend and to choose is ultimately an illusion, a la Spinoza--or merely a variety of determinism, little understood--it does not transfix the argument for responsibility and accountability.
The entire human subset of nature, in space and time, exists in a realm of human perception, human interaction, and human judgment of good and bad, better and worse. Morally, we move toward or away from certain events--beginning with avoiding pain (or blinking our eyes) on a gross level--and continuing to do the same on more subtle and refined levels.
When one dies, it may be correctly seen that the choosing entity goes out of existence. Therefore, even though that life may have been one billiard ball going down the pocket--in reality it was an act within a play. The ultimate "responsibility" for this act (or even whether such a characterization is meaningful) is beyond current knowledge. What is significant is that the roles played by these actors living on the same stage in space and time is IMPORTANT to them--to US. WE definitely feel pain and pleasure and therefore have a stake in how people act. It is this investment in avoiding pain and gaining pleasure which lies at the root of making choices. It is our nature to avoid pain. It does not matter how "determined" this nature was. What matters is that it is a real fact. One method of avoiding pain is to censure the brutes whom cause it.
"you have repeatedly put forward on this thread as the only scientific truth"
Don't be nonsensical. There are myriad "truths" embraced by science on her march of knowledge.
"all the religious dogma you seem to want to compartenmentalize and put into a box and burn."
Huh? You are on another of your wishywashy tangents. I don't want to burn religious dogma! Sheesh! But in the search for understanding and for harmony it is most often a huge obstacle.
"Horrible people make up or follow horrible ideas"
Well...that is exactly what I said, wizard! However, I don't characterise them as "horrible" (or weak) until they have actually followed a horrible idea.
Again, the question of choice in HUMAN life begins and ends with consciousness. This effectively separates the human "experience" from the chain of absolute materialism. The thread is spun and then it is cut. Once cut it does not belong to the skein.
This essentially separates all the skeins from those to come from those before--except for the fact that we can store and transmit accumulated knowledge.
This feather that floats about for 70 years reacting to wind and rain and gravity has a nature. It reacts differently than a piece of steel when the wind blows. If it developed sense organs it would begin (due to its "nature") to have affinity toward and away from certain events or stimuli. As these urges became feelings and desires and as evolution of the senses moved toward interpretive cells...the feather would begin to avoid certain situations and to seek out others. All of this may indeed be "determined" but inasmuch as "desire" is now an essential core of the nature of this feather...all these decisions flow from this fundamental desire (to exist, and to avoid pain).
So even if it is all determined, there is an essential cause of conduct which may be termed DESIRE and which acts to preserve the nature of a thing, i.e. existence of a certain kind. Desire can hurt both the individual and the group. Desire can help both the individual and the group. I favor the former.
That is the best I can put it to you for now. It is mostly my trying to make the most logical guesses. I don't know the truth. And I certainly have nothing intrinsically against religions that DO NOT TRY to impose their values on other people, and do not try to marginalize the freedom of other people to believe as they choose provided the right to be free from force is respected. Now this "right" may be somewhat arbitrary, but it is something that many of us will defend against those we consider savages and brutes. |
