CreativeChaos

To what extent do we have free will when it comes to making, or refraining from making, moral value judgments? Research at the University of Virginia concludes that there are at least five moral responses "hard-wired" into the human brain. They produce instinctive (automatic and immediate) value judgments over which we have little or no control, according to the research.

The moral responses are identified as (1) Harm, i.e., our reaction to the suffering of another person; (2) Reciprocity, i.e., fairness when it comes to waiting our turn, or justice when thinking or knowing someone is guilty; (3) Out Groups, i.e., our feelings about people being influenced by our own sense of "us" and "them"; (4) Hierarchy, i.e., recognizing we are outranked by a more "powerful" person; and Purity, i.e., our disgust with rotten foods.

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The_FD

I pretty agree with what you just wrote, that's a nice point of view to try to classify judgements, though one has to be aware that people's judgement are infinite and very nuanced. Then from time to time it might be difficult to find out a single category for a given human reaction.

Else I want to add that we judge since what we know, and our knowledge and ways of thinking directly come from our education. Thus there is no absolute free in our judgements. I mean for a given person or a given group of person it may seem free because it corresponds to their cultural "natural" choice. But regarding from another cultural background the choice or judgement depends on the people's education.

Hope that you got what i wanted to say

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CreativeChaos

Yes, totally. I agree with what you said. We will make "free will" decisions which are actually based on the culture we are in. We are all social animals and we are "conditioned" from birth to "fit in" with our particular society. We are rather limited in our true "free will" choices, because we can only select from our experiences and knowledge.

However, we do have choices, however limited. And it can make a great difference in your life and others lives as to the choices you make.

As a small example, I got a little kitty from the animal shelter who was about to be "put down" and raised her. She is now 16 years old and has lived a very happy long life. My choice affected her life and the lives of the other kitties that I did not choose.

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The_FD

Then we come to the point of "freedom and choices"
Does to have many choices mean that we are free?

In a perfect freedom (which does not exist using this definition) there would be no choice at all. Since when one makes a choice, he has to judge values and choose the best following his own knowledge. Then the choice cannot be told free because he just used his knowledge (and culture and education...) to make his choice.

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CreativeChaos

Hmm... I think we have come to the point of three things. First, "free will", second "choices" and then the larger word "freedom". "Free will" implies to me, that one does have a number of choices and is free to choose what he/she wills. The more choices one is free to choose from the more freedom that person has, IMO. And the more knowledge and experience one has the more choices one can choose from and hence more freedom, rather than reliance on a limited knowledge experience base. The larger the knowledge and experience base, the higher the quality of choices one can make.

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The_FD

I agree on that point :But not on this one
because the more choices there are the more judgements the person has to do. And each judgement implies the use of his knowledge. The more judgements there is the closer he gets to the limits of his knowledge. And thus his knowledge will get more narrow (narrower?) compared to the number of choices there is to do. Then following what we just said the choices are less free because based on a limited knowledge experience base.

Actually the free of choices depends not only on the knowledge of the person but on the knowledge compared to the importance and numbers of choices there is to do.

Hope I have still been understandable I am not very sure whether my ideas appear as I want to or not... You probably guessed english is not my native language

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CreativeChaos

Yes, you are quite understandable. And I totally agree with your point. Very good assessment. We are kind of reaching that today. Where our ability to have enough knowledge in comparison to choices is where the real limitations are. Since we are in the age of "information overload".

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