Free will?



Comments about the question at the end?
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7 comments:

  1. Unknown3 November 2009 at 20:35

    The main difference is that the cargo is only material but his wife is a human life.

    When a human being needs to make a choice, the major influence on it is the presence of another human. Why? Morality. It's not "moral" to harm another human with the choices we make.

    Perhaps it's because a human life can't be recovered... but material things can be.

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  2. Eric FG5 November 2009 at 17:58

    In my opinion he was forced in both cases.
    When you are in such dangerous situation, you won't think about something like moral. The only point you can think about is how to survive. Of course you try to keep the collateral damage as small as possible, but when there is no other way than to sacrifice the life of your wife for your own, you would do it. The human was always the animal, which sacrificed the most for surviving, that makes us special.

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  3. Unknown5 November 2009 at 20:12

    Okay, and what if you then survive, and you realize you just threw your wife out of the ship for saving your life...
    would you live peacefully? I don't think so. You would regret your animal action, at least for a long time.

    As human can develop its own mind, hence it develops feelings and interpersonal bonds with other humans. On the other side, the mind strength has been proved; driving to conclusions such as 'mind controls the body'. Therefore every change of your mind could provoke a change on how you use your body (or how it works), even leading it to die!

    This proves every non-moral act, even if the conditions don't allow to behave morally, is likely to consume the human consciousness.

    Is it free will? Well, i really don't believe in free will. My opinion is that things happen because everything is set in such a way for it to happen. Human mind is very complex because it reacts to every single aspect of the moment it's in. And the 'sum' of all the reactions leads to make a choice.
    That's my personal point of view.

    And i know it can differ with my previous idea of morality, If the conditions are such to provoke the man to throw his wife, as the human's animal behaviour commands, there is no morality to stop him.

    But it can strongly support it with the argument:
    The conditions of the human mind command the individual to act morally when another human is involved. The man was with his wife on the ship, therefore the dude wasn't obliged to let her wife die.

    And if we involve egoism in that choice, we can take the way to say:
    He had to act on his own self-interest.
    So was his self-interest to live?...
    Or was his self-interest to live (or die) peacefully?...

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  4. vitória5 November 2009 at 20:20

    The man in the video asked why the wrongness would explain that the captain was whether or not forced to do the action, and I think that he WAS forced to do both of the actions, it's a human instinct to do it, he was trying to survive and for that to happen he needed to throw the cargo or his wife over board. But, throw the cargo over board is not wrong, because it can be replaced, it doesn't have feelings and won't die, while his wife is a human being! So, he was forced to do both but in one case it was wrong while in the other it was the right decision.

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  5. Karla Sánchez Ibarra8 November 2009 at 23:22

    As social and racional beings, there are many things always affecting our desicions, and morality is one of them. We do have insticts, but are those instincts strong enough to make us forget about our morality and the consecuences that our acts can have?

    In the first example, the man had to throw his wife's cargo in order to survive. We think he was forced to do it and it was the right think to do, because we compare the consecuences of throwing the cargo and not doing it. If he does, he survive and if he does not he'll probably die. So our instinct is strong enough to force us to throw the cargo, because we measure the damage that it can cause and the benefits we'll receive (surviving).

    In the second option, he had to throw his wife. Looking at the consecuences as we did in the other case, we notice that both of his desicions (throwing his wife or not) are going to produce the death of a human being, but if he decides to throw his wife, then he'll be guilty of her death. Our morality places killing humans as one of the worst things we can do. His instincts to survive are still there, but in this case, when he measures the consecuences of his acts, the reasons for not following them are stronger than before.

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  6. Richard9 November 2009 at 00:05

    it is a very interesting theme i think.
    of course it is not right to throw the woman over board but what happens if you throw her cargo?
    she will complain it and make a lot of stress so maybe it is better to throw her and stay relax.

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  7. Richard9 November 2009 at 23:09

    written by Stella

    Haha Richard that's a very intersing point of view but you are probably right.Well the question is why the wrongness would explain that the captain was whether or not forced to do the action. In my opinion he wasn't forced in neither of the situatons because he's still got the option of throwing himself over board in both cases. Forced is a strong word to use here.But in the first case throwing himself over board seems pointless as the cargo is material and of less value so his choise is obvious and it seems he has done the right thing. In the second case it becomes a bit more complicated as him and his wife both human and of equal value and both have the right to exsist. That's why his choise is complicated in term of a moral issue.What would be the right thin to do. Throw his wife or himself.There is no right or wrong in this case as both of them are in a life threating situation and one of them has to die. It seem like he made the wrong choise because he wasn't forced to do it.

    written by Stella

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