The universe flows matter along a path of entropy to translocate matter as it does. "I" have no control over anything.Steve3007 wrote:Dennis, why do you press the keys on your keyboard? I do it because I think it causes words to appear on my screen. Why do you do it?
You press keys because you *think* (you hold a presumption that) it causes words to appear on your screen? No...
More like this (according to deterministic/compatibilistic philosophy with science): You press keys because environmental conditions trigger biological functions in you, such as action potentials in the neurons of your motor cortex that get activated to submit acetylcholine to your neuromuscular junctions in your fingers along various pathways.
I don't really want to get into semantic's based arguments too much. I think they would de-rail a lot of stuff. We can beat that level of stuff with a stick over-and-over if you want to go that route, but I don't think it's necessary.
I see what you're on about, though. You're targeting my views of causality, which are relevant to the claim of a legal actor being capable of performing an actus reus.
I've already targeted how I don't think light cones (related to arguments about causality), as they were theoretically purported like Minowski, are scientifically accurate. That information is my earlier posts.
I do not think equivocation occurred.Steve3007 wrote:The above argument relies on a fallacy of equivocation in (1) over the word "reasonable".
However, there was a problem with the syllogism as it was expressed.
I corrected the syllogism's premise with a later post, whereby I had realized the premise for the conclusion was inappropriate for the syllogism.
Here is a corrected version of the syllogism:
1) If it is logical (reasonable) to hold a doubt because no one has the authority to know anything if but only theorize, then one cannot prove one or more defendants guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
2) It is logical (reasonable) to hold a doubt because no one has the authority to know anything if but only theorize.
Therefore, one cannot prove one or more defendants guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
The concept of reasonableness is varied and started in approximately the later 1800s along with negligence law (from my study of law).Steve3007 wrote:...that is not the way that the word "reasonable" is used in the term "beyond reasonable doubt" in a legal context...
I don't have the sources for this anymore. A law historian might be able to help confirm.
In more recent pedagogical approaches (from what I've read of what is taught in law school), reasonableness is associated with the concept of "the reasonable person" of whom is a "legal fiction."
From what I've deduced, such is an analog for "God almight" or "God-in-the-highest." The reasonable person is the legal system's "God," for which the individual is alleged to be reasonable in all of its behaviors and incapable of doing anything wrong. It's behaviors are sensible and in self-defense, thus ensuring that alll behaviors are "logical" (reasonable): They were optimal in their characteristic and no better could be done.
This reminds me of how I read a legal case about attorneys squabbling over standards of evidence and what it really means for something to be "beyond a reasonable doubt" and "proven beyond a preponderance of the evidence" and such. As far as I looked into it, no judge has been brave enough to really set out an opinion on how to define the standards of evidence. Regardless, I've already touched on the strawman-aspect of things.Steve3007 wrote:In that and similar contexts it means "beyond a high threshold of probability which is considered very likely though not certain".
This is your argument:
"high threshold of probability which is considered very likely though not certain" = "reasonable doubt"
The probability of something being true or false is 50%. Something either is or is not true: Bivalence.
"very likely though not certain"
Where is this "very likely" aspect coming from? That sounds like judicial bias to me. What makes you think something is "very" likely? How, in what way, are you getting beyond the 50% mark? Really? How? I'd like to "know."
Do you have a monopoly on all things in reality, whereby such monopoly grants you the authority to claim whether or not something is "very likely," thus deserving to go beyond the threshold of uncertainty, which lays at the teetering 50% mark?
I hold a doubt that 1+1=2 because I do not have the authority to know anything if but only theorize.
Maybe 1+1 equals 10, which would be binary.
Why do I have to believe the answer is in the decimal system?
Are you saying I should be conditioned to believe such and am failing to be conditioned as you like?
Have you ever turned on a light switch only for the light to not turn on?Steve3007 wrote:So do you ever wonder why certain events always happen after certain other events?
Have you ever turned the keys in the ignition of a vehicle only for the ignition to not start?
Answer to your question: Not really, much anymore because I see things as co-incidences. I've come to believe it's all a big coincidence. People have compatibilistic beliefs that are tied to competition amongst genetic relatives for socio-economic status in relation to the monopoly on violence. It seems that if people manage to get suckered into believing in compatibilism, then they've corrupted themselves and reduced their fitness in the scheme of evolution.