[Vision2020] Ethical Absurdity, Determinism & Free Will

[Ted Moffett]

Chas. et. al.

Thanks for your reply.

A few responses below between your text:


On 12/30/06, Chasuk <chasuk at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 12/30/06, Ted Moffett <starbliss at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I'm not sure, Chas, if you believe in absolutist or relativistic ethics,
> but in practice in our society it is clear we do apply majority rule to
> determining very profound ethical principles.  Look at the death penalty,
> which I also oppose, often defended with polls expressing that the clear
> majority of the US public support the death penalty.
>
> I'm not certain, either.  Intellectually, I support relativistic
> ethics.  Emotionally, I am an absolutist.  Pragmatically, I'm a
> combination of both.  There are very few human behaviors about which I
> am absolutist: female circumcision (the wrongness thereof) being one
> of them.  Generally, I say whatever floats your boat, as long as it is
> consensual.  I extend that rule further than anyone I know, yet my
> visceral response to some human behaviors makes me a hypocrite.


Indeed, I feel this hypocrisy every day of the week!  It pains me
considerably!

This is especially complicated because I don't believe in the
> existence of the soul, or that any entity has free will, which makes
> us meat machines, and therefore culpable for nothing.


I have given the issue of determinism and free will some thought.

Determinism should be understood in the context that we do not know for
certain that all events in the universe are determined, their is
considerable "looseness" in the chains of causality operating in some
systems, and that thinking machines may be constructed to make unpredictable
choices based on their own "well being."

Punishment (an "ethical" act?), if it helps the machine return to normal
function, could be a form of "repair," or "moral" reform.  The thinking
machine is made more aware it "malfunctioned" when restrained by other law
enforcement machines.  Of course, this is not morality as commonly
understood.

But why should not immensely complicated biological machines feel a need for
revenge against other machines that restrain, impair or harm them?  And then
realize they have no logical/factual basis in the ultimate eternal structure
of the universe to complain, given that they will all wear out and expire,
and it will all end in Entropy's destiny, perhaps?  Machines aware of the
ethical absurdity of life?

We may be very complicated biological "machines," but of an order of
complexity that renders comparison with all current human made machines a
false comparison.

I think a definition of "free will" can be constructed within forms of
determinism.  A person who is aware of how to control aspects of the world
and themselves, and is placed in an environment that allows numerous
choices, can make unpredictable choices/actions to further their well being
based on this knowledge, when living in a society that allows this
"freedom"; these choices may be determined, in many ways (brain
biochemistry, cultural conditioning, etc.).  But an environment of numerous
options present for the thinking well educated biological machine in a
"free" society, is what can be meant by exercising "free will."  No one may
be able to predict the outcome of a society of hundreds of millions of well
educated thinking biological machines operating with numerous options
unrestrained in a complex environment.  I know this is not the conventional
view of free will, nor of a strict determinism, but it makes more scientific
sense than some other views of "free will."

The two conditions that maximize "free will" for our thinking biological
machines are a diverse education and freedom to operate in a complex
environment offering numerous options.

Take away the diverse education and the freedom to operate and according to
this view of "free will" there is no or very limited free will.  Even given
the view of "free will" as a faculty that a person still possesses even in
jail, when they have the freedom to think and feel what they want in the
freedom of their mind, while their bodies are restrained, a lack of
education will limit the options available to their mind, the ability to
exercise "free will."  This same argument would apply to a artificially
intelligent computer with a limited data set about the world.

Ted Moffett
--------------


That's what I
believe intellectually.  I still want to retaliate against those who
have trespassed against me, or against those whom I love, whether they
are morally at fault or not.  This dialogue becomes moot if what I
believe intellectually is true in an absolute sense, but it also makes
it inescapable.

Interesting discussion, Ted.  The most compelling and simultaneously
frustrating questions in life (from my perspective) are the question
of free will, and question 'what is man?'  I've studied them
continuously for over 30 years, and I'm further from an answer than I
was when I started.

Chas
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