I'm with Feynman on this, let's see some examples that unravel the word scramble. :chin:

Is it that difficult to understand?

You were active twelve minutes ago and posted that comment seven minutes ago. You spent five minutes reading. You could try a little harder.

Okay, here is an example: a deranged philosophy forum poster goes on a sexist tirade. They should only be held responsible if they were making a free choice. If they are so sexist that they are just acting in accordance with their nature, and made no free choice, they shouldn't be held responsible. They should still be banned for being a sexist piece of crap, but they shouldn't be blamed for the tirade per se.

edit: better example incoming but I don't want to chain post

Thus, in the context of code law and free choice, one’s choices should be taken as the sole condition necessary for someone to be held accountable for breaking a very specific law, and, thus, people cannot be held responsible for their actions if they did not make a choice to break any such laws. — ToothyMaw

I think modern law already takes this into consideration. That's why we have degrees of murder, for example - from involuntary manslaughter, second degree, first degree etc...

thus, people cannot be held responsible for their actions if they did not make a choice to break any such laws — ToothyMaw

How does this accord with the judicial "Ignorance of the law is no excuse"?

I think modern law already takes this into consideration. That's why we have degrees of murder, for example - from involuntary manslaughter, second degree, first degree etc... — 8livesleft

Whether or not something is manslaughter, first degree murder, etc. is dependent upon interpretation of law and circumstances, and is not specific enough to be broken only according to an action. Thus, such things have little to do with my conclusion, which says that if someone does not make a free choice in selecting to break a very specific law, they should not be held accountable for their actions at all.

How does this accord with the judicial "Ignorance of the law is no excuse"? — jgill

You could stipulate that arbitrarily, but it doesn't follow from anything having to do with free choice.

edit: even if you stipulate it arbitrarily it comes into contact with free choice I think

(Clearer OP)

I will get this out of the way: this is primarily about the functioning of code law in terms of our moral principles; code law does not need an irrefutable philosophical underpinning to function, but it makes more sense in terms of moral culpability if we keep our laws open to interpretation, which is the main point of this post.

Some theories of moral culpability are predicated on the idea of freedom of choice, the idea that one could have both chosen otherwise and that one’s choice is unaffected by external causation. This idea of moral culpability based upon freedom of choice - both the ability to act freely and to act free of external causation - is at odds with determinism, which is Pierre-Simon, Marquis de Laplace’s classic formulation that the present state of the universe is the effect of its previous state and the cause of the state that follows it. Furthermore, if a mind, at any given moment, could know all of the forces operating in nature and the respective positions of all its components, it would thereby know with certainty the future and the past of every entity, large or small.

Determinism and freedom of choice have heavy implications for code law, which is a set of very specific laws. The conditions for a very specific law to be broken are mostly distinct from other very specific laws - they are very specific. Thus, one’s actions, and thus choices, are mostly what determines if they are broken. Well, if one believes in free choice the breaking of these laws is the result of a self-contained causal chain beginning with the free choice. This implies that there is nothing affecting the choice other than whatever it is that is inherent to free actions that is free.

This quality is not a cause in and of itself except insofar as it causes free actions to be free. Thus, there are no original, external causes for the very specific law to be broken. There are proximate causes, but if the cause is taken to be the action, then the law being broken is a function of something that couldn't have been otherwise; the free choice causing the action is not taken into account.

Therefore, the proximate cause must be the free choice, which, as a function of cause and effect, satisfies the conditions for the very specific law being broken. Thus, if code law is to be predicated on free choice, there is no room for external causation; the choices resulting in the conditions for the law being broken are externally uncaused.

I now bring up the idea of PAP (possible alternate possibilities) from the Frankfurt Cases presented by Harry Frankfurt. It dictates that:
(1) PAP: An agent is responsible for an action only if said agent could have done otherwise.
(2) An agent could have done otherwise only if causal determinism is false.
(3) Therefore, an agent is responsible for an action only if causal determinism is false.

The PAP will become relevant in a moment.

Since code law, if predicated upon free choice, leaves no room for external causation, there is a contradiction; there are without a doubt mostly or wholly unfree choices that result in very specific laws being broken. Thus, in terms of moral culpability, the application of very specific laws must either necessarily preclude genuine free choice or take into account proximate, external causes for non-arbitrary, non-random choices. If it precludes freedom of choice then, assuming determinism is true, the PAP apply, and no one is morally culpable.

The escape hatch is to assert that only the freedom to act exists, but, even then, genuine free choice is precluded; external, proximate factors affecting the choice would remain.

Thus, if determinism is true, our intuitions with respect to moral culpability make little sense, especially in terms of rules that are broken mostly as a result of actions.