Moderation Questions

Free will doesn't work. It's good to pretend it does though.

But uncertainty exists at a quantum level, and biological factors influence decision making, the ability to recognize and act on virtue despite personal cost demonstrates an emergent form of free will, where moral agency is real and meaningful.

If you want to make the case free will, operating within the framework of the universe is pre planned, you'd be making an argurment with far less scientific substance than the later - or maybe im completely mis interpreting what your saying.

Is it good to pretend that life prevails over death in the end? That life is ultimate reality?

Truth is our orienting mechanism. In one direction is rational truth. In another direction is “the good”.

Should we point ourselves toward rational truth or toward the good?

Once you realize that you should orient yourself toward the good above all, then you should associate truth with goodness (rather than rational truth).

historical examples show that nothing changes in those situations

There is a personal cost of not acting on virtue as well. Not sure this is anyhting to do with free will.

Quantum uncertainty leading to free will is grasping at straws. Randomness means things are not determined, but it doesn't mean you get to decide.

For "God" sake can we get back to just moderation talk?

Not really grasping at straws when the physics points to consciousness existing.

The ability to act on "virtue" against your interests is possible because in the ancestral environment "virtue" was adaptive.

Awareness is also not free will, but I think physics is a long way from saying anything about consciousness and if you're thinking about stuff like Schrodinger's cat, that's making something out of "observer" that isn't really there.

Consciousness is interesting precisely because physics cannot say anything about it. Yet it exists.

Isn't it linked to specific waves? Physics can measure that at least

It's linkde with all sorts of things. It's linked with brain states etc which can all be measured. Nothing in physics touches the conciousness bit. It's the wrong sort of thing

Unless you want to be a dualist then physics is saying a lot about it

Dualism is that there are different kinds of stuff. Conscious experience may be a property of the same stuff but it still isn't the subject of physics.

If you mean it in the tautological sense that experience being something is dualism or idealism then OK but clearly experience is something.

I think that the ability to weigh competing outcomes is what makes moral agency significant. If a person recognizes that both acting virtuously and failing to do so come with personal costs, then the decision making process becomes a meaningful exercise of agency.

If decisions were strictly deterministic, i'd assume that you would see uniformity in the responses, yet we see massive variation in those decisions. To me, that's fairly strong evidence that choice is not predetermined - unless God has a sense of humor i guess.

-So for the record I just wanted to clarify this type of posting is acceptable in the forum now? Calling people Uncle Toms and Mother ****ers and then saying all the children that were murdered on 10/7 got what they deserved?

-I mean, if it is no holds barred and you can personally attack and call other forum members anything you want and say children deserve to be murdered, that is fine. I just want to clarify whether this is acceptable posting for everyone, or just Karl?

when did he say that?

his sentiment is no different than the scores of posters who blame the Palestinians for all of the children dead in Gaza. in fact, they do it with much more glee.

"You reap what you sow" in regards to dead children certainly implies that the children "sowed" something, i.e. did something terrible so deserve to "reap" something terrible.

None of the children on either side have done anything terrible. The adults on both sides can be blamed to various degrees. Personally I feel the most animosity towards adults who deliberately bring children into what they know will be a terrible life of suffering.

well he says it in regards to the parents so

fwiw I dont really cosign his point here, but I am just pointing out the simple lack of comprehension or bad faith being used to try to tattle on the guy.

He had like 10 posts in a burst that were directionally all pointing in the same direction. It is not like that was a 1 off post. Trust me when I say I have been moderated strongly on multiple occasions for much less.

right well I am not commenting on if he should be moderated, just that both of these are blatantly false assertions.

Nah. That is just how you feel about it. His meaning was pretty clear in context.

The banter in the I/P thread is exactly how it should be. No threats of timeouts. No bans. Just men getting things off their chest. Nobody is being hurt. I get you bringing this up for clarification given how micro managed the forum used to be. I think if people want to reveal who they really are let them. Also, that guy will probably go over the top at some point so I say let him hang himself.