u/Other_Attention_2382

If Modern hard determinism views The Will as a product of physical, biological, and social causal chains rather than a purely innate metaphysical force. This materialist reframing strips away metaphysical pessimism, potentially aligning Schopenhauer's thoughts closer in reach to the non-duality he was so fond of?

Is it his view on The Will that keeps the pessimism in place?

Or is his pessimism a better description of reality?

Hitler. Bless him. Rough childhood, failed at art school, targeted minorities.

When Stalin's son was captured he was rumoured to prefer his son to be executed and die with honour.

The Roman Empire built a society heavily focused on status, class division, and civic elitism.

Good vs Evil = seperation.

Praise and blame creates a barrier to Hitler understanding his chain of cause and effect.

Everything we learn is from others or brain states and experiences we had no choice in creating.

Peace to the evil believers. ✌️

The idea of the school seemed to be a kind of experiment to see how the children would evolve without strict rule, dogma, so you could say without external coercion.

The school experiment looked like it might have turned into something like The Lord of the flies, but without the murder.

His daughter who went to the school said the experiment affected her, and she even turned to Christianity which is kind of funny considering her fathers view on religious dogma. It seems she felt she needed rules and structure in her early life.

The son who also attended suffered alot later on with schizophrenia etc.

Although I guess in a way they kind of had to follow their fathers rules of no rules.

Does any of this align with Galen Strawson's Basic Argument? : Problem children arriving at the school with internal desires they didn't form combined with no external coercion?

Or would you say it highlights children need to understand consequences? Like sheep that need to be guided.

The idea of the school seemed to be a kind of experiment to see how the children would evolve without strict rule, dogma, so you could say without external coercion.

The school experiment looked like it might have turned into something like The Lord of the flies, but without the murder.

His daughter who went to the school said the experiment affected her, and she even turned to Christianity which is kind of funny considering her fathers view on religious dogma. It seems she felt she needed rules and structure in her early life.

The son who also attended suffered alot later on with schizophrenia etc.

Although I guess in a way they kind of had to follow their fathers rules of no rules.

Does any of this align with Galen Strawson's Basic Argument? : Problem children arriving at the school with internal desires they didn't form combined with no external coercion?

Or would you say it highlights children need to understand consequences? Like sheep that need to be guided.

If Hard Determinism + A block universe is reality then does one need to make assumptions and essentially a leap of faith of what is this mystical thing around us is?

Or is the leap of faith what it's about?

If Hard Derminism is similar to Rupert Spira with regards to freewill and the self, but also has the heavy weight of science behind it why do people choose to prefer mysticism over stuff that is heavily science backed by people like Einstein?

Hard Determinism essentially means there is no freewill and seperation from others. Rupert Spira thinks there is no freewill and no seperation.

What makes someone like Einstein find comfort in cold Hard indifferent Hard Determinism vs someone finding comfort in mysticism?

In everyday life, we do not inspect our minds to "find" a desire before we act, rather, our desires are manifested in the actions themselves.

Acting from a childhood base of "Bundle of fleeting perceptions" "Reason is slave to the passions" self you did not author. Because the mind is a bundle of passing perceptions and passions, your current desires arise from past causes outside your control.

Meaning free will and basic desert do not exist?

"Hume suffered from what 18th-century physicians called the "Disease of the Learned"—a severe nervous breakdown characterized by depression, intense anxiety, listlessness, and psychosomatic symptoms. This breakdown was triggered directly by his obsessive, isolated philosophical brooding.

Connecting his breakdown to his theory of "acting on internal desires without external coercion" ;

He seemed to possibly believe that humans are completely ignorant of their ultimate nature, and his view on freedom could be seen to be more on the lines of something like : We are biological machines driven entirely by internal impulses, and the best we can hope for is that external forces don't get in our way?

If you put it together with his "Reason is slave to the passions" and "Bundle of fleeting perceptions self", then could you view him as having a very pessimistic view of freedom?

So for Hume maybe the compatabilist "Acting on internal desires without external coercion" actually means : internal desires are entirely determined by prior causes outside of our control?

For many "acting on internal desires without external coercion" could be interpreted to mean being judged on your most recent bundle of perceptions self, but what Hume actually meant was : acting without external coercion does not mean your choices come from a vacuum or a chaotic bundle of thoughts. It means your actions flow predictably and naturally from your fully determined internal character and desires?

A sort of strict causation meets practical psychology.

Maybe Galen Strawson who is seemed to be sn expert on Hume, go's into this in his book on Hume? And I'm guessing it inspired his Basic Argument?

Aka, something acts on their internals through an indifferent inevitible external coercion/fate?

Surely someone becoming a psychopath is either/or/and a result of genetics, trauma, or biology and brain damage.

No choice involved in any of that.

Kind of Hard fate whether one ends up an empath or a psychopath?

What seperates Charles Whitman's brain and actions from the psychopath regarding free choice?

Whitman remained fully conscious and painfully aware that his thoughts were abnormal.

Does it suggest that conscious self-awareness and the neural circuits for impulse regulation operate via different pathways?

Are the psychopaths internal desires entirely shaped by external coercion? So Compatabilism is at best a necessary psychological functioning illusion built for society to handle hard fate?

If the Grandaddy of modern Compatabilism Thomas Hobbes strongly believed in God's absolute omnipotence and a deterministic view of the universe akin to predestination or hard necessity, i'd say Charles Whitman's suicide note might agree with that, except he would likely swap God for indifferent Hard determined fate, and reject the choice enabled concept of Good vs Evil that allows him to be branded as Evil.

Compatabilism originated in ancient Greco-Roman philosophy to reconcile fate with human moral agency in a time when you couldnt escape a belief in fate. Leaving no choice but to re-define freedom.

Nobody chooses their most important cultural norms base - their upbringing.

Nobody gets to decide to choose empathy over psychopathy after those first "cultural norms".

If Compatibilism can look at 1st and 2nd order desires, you could also look at 1st and secondary cultural norms. John Wayne Gacy's childhood cultural norms could be seen to make him have a hard determined view of state cultural norms. A determined rage against secondary cultural norms. The clown suit represents 1st cultural norms and the killings represents the projection onto secondary cultural norms.

1st order cultural norms are far more powerful than secondary cultural norms.

If Marty Mcfly went back in time and killed Hitler as a baby everyone would be labelling it as morally responsible.

Compatibilism can be seen as Top down. Capitalism relies on praise and blame/meritocracy. Calvanism gave power to the state and the self. The justice system is built on praise and blame, etc.

Believing in good vs evil, us vs them keeps Satan worship alive.

Nobody chooses their Psychological foundations and first cultural norms.

Nobody suddenly chooses to be an empath or a psychopath.

Nobody chooses their desires and thoughts or mental illness.

Nobody chooses to rage against society.

✌️ Peace

Would Compatabilist's agree with this description of Compatabilism? ;

If our most primal instinct and biggest drive is protecting the "self", Compatabilist's believe we should be judged by that self even if that self is an illusion (and they believe possibly a necessary illusion to function in society)?

Compatabilism as a sort of re-definition of freedom that allows it to sit between the scientific lean towards science backed fatalism and meaningless of existence in an indifferent universe VS evolutionary self serving drive?

And "Reason is slave to the passions". Reason cannot make you care or act. So evolutionary drives drive an individual's reasoning.

A sort of meeting halfway between the cold indifferent hard facts of science and a universal biological drive to identify as an autonomous self serving self?

If Hard Determinists and Compatabilist's largely agree reason is slave to the passions then those passions need a re-definition of freedom for society?

So Compatabilism could be seen as navigating Psychological evolutionary savage drive reality with metaphysical nessisity reality?

We might be fully determined but that doesn't stop us being driven by another invisible force that tells us we are not for survival?

If strict causation Compatabilism believes in the same fate that a Hard Determinist does, then they both essentially believe our lives are pre-determined. That the way we die has already been determined.

Compatabilism re-defines freedom to keep moral responsibility.

The founders of Compatabilism, the stoics believed is a devine fate.

What seperates modern psychology from the likes of Sapolsky and Sam Harris?

Spinoza believed that understanding everything happens out of nessisity gives the only freedom worth caring about as it seperates passive emotions from active emotions.

What seperates Modern psychology from the above?

Would society adopting Hard Determinism be healthy considering we might be hardwired to believe we are in control?

If strict causation Compatabilism believes in the same fate that a Hard Determinist does, then they both essentially believe our lives are pre-determined. That the way we die has already been determined.

Compatabilism re-defines freedom to keep moral responsibility.

The founders of Compatabilism, the stoics believed is a devine fate.

What seperates modern psychology from the likes of Sapolsky and Sam Harris?

Spinoza believed that understanding everything happens out of nessisity gives the only freedom worth caring about as it seperates passive emotions from active emotions.

What seperates Modern psychology from the above?

You get zapped on the head by lightning walking down the street. Both Compatabilist's and Hard Determinists agree it was physical causation at work.

Compatabilism agrees that every choice that led us to being killed in an accident was fully determined?

That sounds alot like fatalism even if it doesnt want to be associated with fatalism?

So how does say someone not controlling themselves in a road rage accident actually work regarding causation in the mind for the Compatabilist?

If a Compatabilist doesn't believe in basic desert but believes in consequentialism, where does the ability to fear consequences come from vs someone else? If someones immediate primary "society" was lawless, how does that person go back to a base that wasnt lawless? If ones foundations were faulty, and everything is traced back to the Big Bang foundation?

Under strict physical causation isn't the gun always pointing at your head through external coercion? Unless your desires and character are formed outside strict physical causation?

Aside from genetics and brain structure, Neurodevelopmental & Biological Factors, etc (no choice in that), is the rest of human dysfunction a coping mechanism to ease internal desires. Maladaptive coping?

With every positive character trait there's an opposite to it.

The control freak's behavior isn't a freely chosen strategy, it is an unconscious, determined reaction to past experiences, trauma, or anxieties that their brain forces them to adopt for survival.

Control freaks cannot see that being a control freak is an "internal desire" coping mechanism.

if the control freak does see it as a coping mechanism, the illusion of control breaks down and anxiety takes over, and they lack the conscious, unconstrained ability to do otherwise.

Is it a coincidence that the founder of CBT was hugely influenced by Spinoza?

Can a choice be truly "free" if it is driven by a psychological blind spot?

Can a choice be truly free if its not a blind spot, but too painful to accept?

Is this universal fear/defence mechanism best overcome through understanding defence mechanisms are ego and "self" based (internal desires, character, etc)?

That letting go means understanding you were never in control in the first place, and if so is society built around the self and meritocracy, a barrier to that?

Taoism seems a great way to view things.

But ;

IF you believe everything is Hard Determined ego doesn't exist anyway as there is nothing to defend and nothing to surrender? So only awareness of that remains.

Science looks to things without emotion and without the need for mysticism or a belief in ghosts etc.

Hard Determinism examines why one's past created one's effects. Does that cover yin and yang?

If you believe in a block universe then Taoism aligns with that flow.

So does Hard Determinism kind of cover Taoism with the added weight/confidence of science?

The US Vs Them thing.

The divide when science strongly suggests there is no divide, and supports a more - The damaged vs the more damaged view and a lack of choice in the matter of what one us?

The psychopath doesn't choose to be a psychopath any more than an empath chooses to be an empath.

"Evil" = Hatred in the name of goodness?

Is there a direct link, but a kind of uncomfortable one, kind of like how linking Hard Determinism to Fatalism gets people's backs up?

Or have probabilities creeped in more since Einstein's block universe?

Like for example, I know I'm abit mad, but does that understanding why i'm abit mad help me stop being abit mad?

Could a long term belief in Hard Determinism kind of lead to a kind of Buddhist non self Compatabilism rational observer through conscious relection on cause and effect?

Hence why Hard Determinist's often morph into Compatabilist's??

Was Spinoza as much a Compatabilist as a Hard Determinist with this kind of thinking?

The belief in a Hard determinism science God creates an observer to the non self made self?

Hard Determinism = acceptance of ones inevitable chain stage>>less reactive with guilt and blame>>rational observer of ones mind>>>>>>>>>>>>>>until one reacts less from external coercion??

But the whole chain had to start from believing i had no choice in the matter?

If Hume described "the self" as a fleeting bundle of perceptions and viewed it difficult for anyone to really get to know themselves, and modern science and most Compatabilist's and Hard Determinists agree with the "bundle of perceptions".

Then does this go towards validating Galen Strawson's Basic Argument?

• 1. Action from character: We act the way we do in any given situation because of the way we are.
• 2. Need for responsibility: To be ultimately responsible for what we do, we must be responsible for the way we are (our mental nature and character).
• 3. The impossibility of self-creation: To be responsible for the way we are, we must have intentionally and consciously chosen to be that way in the past.
• 4. The infinite regress: But to have made those past choices, we must have had a prior character that guided those decisions—meaning we would have had to make even earlier choices to form that character. This creates an infinite regress, requiring us to have existed forever or to have made a first, uncaused choice.
• 5. Conclusion: Since an infinite chain of past decisions is impossible, and we cannot be the ultimate creator of ourselves, it is impossible to possess ultimate moral responsibility.

So does this go in anyway to agreeing with Strawson's argument? Aka no freewill.