Determinism and EA

By ASiva @ 2024-12-20T08:31 (–1)

If you are already aware of what determinism is and the moral implications of the philosophy you can skip this section and go straight to what it means to believe in EA and determinism simultaneously.

 For the rest of you (which I assume is most people on this forum as there hasn't been a prior post about determinism) I will be arguing that humans don't have free will. 

I won't do any sophistry and get straight to the point. If you hold a rock in the air and know its velocity, air resistance, and everything there is to know about it, you can predict exactly how it will fall with 100% accuracy. 

People may be pointing out quantum mechanics but I'll introduce it later as having a simple system makes it easier for comprehension. 

Say there’s a box, inside this box is just air. The box is completely cut off from the rest of the world. It stands to reason that if you knew the velocity, spin, direction, etc, of every atom in the box, you can predict exactly how the air will move, a minute later, a day later, or even a year later. Therefore you can surmise that the air inside the box has only one future, the air currents will move in the ways predicted, and it’s impossible for it to not. The integral concept to wrap your brain around is that the universe is the box. The universe doesn’t randomly pop matter into existence, all that was created during the Big Bang is all that will ever be created and the universe’s laws are consistent and unchanging. If I could know the properties of all the atoms in the universe, I could predict the future until the end of time. Therefore, there’s only one possible way the future will play out. There’s nothing we can do to change that. In fact, humans are made of atoms. 

You can clearly see under this model of the universe (where every law is deterministic) there's no room for free will. But what does that actually mean? 

Say, for example, a person choosing which type of ice cream to buy: vanilla or chocolate. You may think the person has a choice but he doesn’t, there’s only one possible choice he can make. It’s based on many factors, maybe you already had chocolate before, maybe as a child vanilla was cheaper, or maybe you were born with taste buds receptive to vanilla. What influences your choices could be as minute as how tired you are to how fast you’re breathing. This is not to say that we’re all puppets on a string; humans can think, can rationalize our choices but our choices are already set in stone. A person can only delude themselves into thinking they have a choice. To better elucidate this concept, say that time rewound 5 seconds with nothing changed, everything would play out in the exact same way. You would still behave exactly the same way. You may think this sounds far-fetched but determinism is a widely held belief among physicists, take for example theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder who created a video titled “You don't have free will, but don't worry.” In the end, everything about what makes us, us, comes down to two factors: environment and genetics.

Okay, but you may say that's obviously not how the universe works, there's quantum mechanics. Introducing quantum mechanics to the system, simply means that what makes you act are either completely random factors (quantum mechanics) and completely deterministic factors. 

Each factor that influences a person does has a logic chain, like a billiard ball hitting another one, these factors can be in the quadrillions, like maybe I typed this certain sentence structure because of a book I read 10 years ago and because I inhaled in a certain way etc etc.  My point is thus, each factor that influences a persons action, eventually goes outside of their control, somehow whether it be environment or genetics.

I’ve heard many times that the three things that dictate a person’s life are genetics, environment and the choices they make. Since the last option is something that I’ve shown is out of our control that leaves us with the environment and genetics. By environment, I mean everything surrounding your life, where you were born, when you were born, your parents, income, etc. These two facets of a person's life are uncontrollable and not the fault of the person. A person does not dictate what happens to them or where they’re born nor can they control their genes.  But if you cannot choose anything you do, does morality even exist? 

Morality 

This brings me to my main point and where this intersects with EA, you cannot judge people on the basis of morality. 

The definition of morality in my opinion is the question of what is right and wrong or good and bad behavior. As people cannot choose their actions, it stands to reason that people cannot be morally good or morally bad, they’re just amoral. Actions can be morally wrong but people can’t be; the act of killing is morally wrong yet the murderer is not in the wrong. Let’s assume that Person A unjustly killed Person B in a fit of rage, the act of murder can be condemned but not the murderer.  Person A is an amoral actor in this scenario as they cannot choose to do anything else, all the factors that led to this scenario weren’t something he could control. In basic terms, Person A lacks agency as there’s no free will so can’t really judge him as a whole. That’s not to say Person A shouldn’t be put into prison, even if he holds no accountability for the act, his predilection for murder should bar him from the rest of society as he may be a danger. However, the predilection for bad behavior and immoral actions does not make someone immoral because it’s not the fault of the person. It’s due to some combination of his environment and genetics. Even if you take this all into consideration, what’s the point in thinking about life in this way?

Adhering to determinism makes you more understanding of people and empathetic. People are born beings who more often than not are blank slates, genetics don’t influence a lot of our behavior. A person's environment can change a person more than their genes. If I was born in Libya and drafted as a child soldier, even with the same genetics, I’d be so far removed from the person I am now. You should look at your fellow man and show empathy almost always, because they’re not the ones at fault for their own mistakes, it’s just a series of factors outside of their control. With different circumstances, you could have ended up exactly like them. This also makes it much easier to be kind to others and better understand them, no one does an action for no reason, there’s always some factor at play guiding them whether they realize it or not. Let’s say for example someone shoves me in the hallway, thinking about it from this point of view, why get angry at him? There’s a reason he shoved me, most likely an unjustified one but a reason nonetheless. There’s no reason to yell or start a fight as there’s no reason to punish him, especially since there’s factors influencing his decision that, if I understood, would make me more sympathetic. 

How this connections to EA

Many times I come across people who struggle with saying that not donating is tantamount to indirect murder, mainly because of the seriousness of the crime. But under the lens of determinism, this is simply how they were brought up, and you are no better, simply luckier. Not saying indirect murder isn't morally wrong. 

Keep in mind although I'm calling determinism a philosophy, it's not a moral philosophy, determinism is often paired with utilitarianism, but it doesn't have to be. The central claim of determinism is regarding accountability. 

The act of murder is wrong. 

The murderer has done a terrible thing.

The murderer is not a bad person.  

The act of charity is good. 

The giver is has done a incredible thing. 

The giver is not a good person.

So you shouldn't look down or judge people who don't donate. As there are truly no good or bad people only lucky and unlucky people. This helped me get over a bit of a savior complex and arrogance I had. 

This can be a very very hard pill to swallow, and often where I lose people. When I talk about controlling your anger and empathy and forgiveness  it's easy but trying to live a life without pride and trying absolute forgiveness is borderline impossible. 

It could also lead to a existential crisis but it really shouldn't, you are a part of the universe, not outside of it. It makes sense you're subject to it's laws. 

I'm not saying I'm perfect either obviously I don't live to this standard, but it's a ideal that's worth striving towards. 

Obviously there are counter arguments if anyone's interested leave your disagreements in the comments. 

Mainly I'm just trying to empathy and increase forgiveness, if this philosophy doesn't do that for you and instead makes you nihilist then forget about it. 

Btw if my writing style sounds jarring and a bit pretentious I spliced this post with a essay I wrote in 11th grade.