What is mechanical determinism ? Which is more plausible, mechanical determinism or free will?

Determinism is a philosophical theory about the causality, necessity and regularity of things, and occupies an important position in the system of philosophical theories. According to the different factors that determine the historical development of society, historical determinism is divided into four categories: theological teleology, idealism, mechanistic and historical determinism of historical materialism.

Theological teleological determinism of historical determinism reduces causal connections in social history to the pre-arranged results of God, Providence, or Providence hidden in the dark, and the course and outcome of history are determined entirely by this mysterious thing. This view, on the surface, God or God is the cause of all things, in fact, fundamentally denies that things have their own cause and effect and laws, so in essence, it belongs to the historical determinism of idealism, which is a kind of indeterminism. Idealistic historical determinism acknowledges the inevitability and regularity of social and historical development, but does not recognize the objective reality of social historical movements.

It always regards spiritual things as the decisive factor in the development and change of society, as the fundamental cause and main driving force of the historical process. Mechanical determinism is to take matter and its mechanical motion as the decisive factor, and simply extend Laplace's dynamic determinism from nature directly to the field of social history.

Mechanical determinism applies only to macroscopic objects, while the study of the microscopic realm and the abundance of contingent phenomena in the objective world gives rise to statistical determinism. Statistical laws that apply probabilistic and statistical methods to study do not constitute a negation of objective laws, and therefore do not constitute a negation of determinism. In essence, it is dialectical determinism that acknowledges that contingency and necessity are both opposites and unified.

Historical determinism, on the other hand, regards economic factors as the factors that determine the direction of social and historical development.

Mechanical determinism is also known as "metaphysical determinism". It refers to a metaphysical viewpoint established on the basis of classical mechanics that prevailed in Western Europe from the 17th to the 18th centuries and only recognized the causality, inevitability and objective regularity of nature, and denied the subjective initiative and contingency of human beings.

Inevitability and regularity.

Mechanistic determinism is the taking of matter and its mechanical motion as the decisive factor.

Both mechanical determinism and libertary pose challenges to moral responsibility, but in different ways. Mechanistic determinism holds that our behavior is determined by factors such as our genetics, environment, and experience, and therefore we do not have complete free will. This means that our actions are not autonomous, but are the result of external influences.

In this case, the concept of moral responsibility seems to lose its meaning, as we cannot be held accountable for our actions.

In contrast, libertarism holds that we have complete free will to make decisions autonomously. However, this theory also faces challenges. If our actions are completely autonomous, then we must bear all the consequences and be responsible for our decisions.

However, we face a lot of uncertainties and unknowns that can lead us to make harmful decisions. In this case, it seems that we are also not responsible for our actions.

Thus, both mechanical determinism and libertary pose challenges to moral responsibility, but they are trapped in different ways. Mechanistic determinism holds that our behavior is influenced by external factors, while libertary theory holds that we have complete free will. Regardless of the theory, there are some unsolvable problems, so we need to rethink the concept of moral responsibility and find a more comprehensive and comprehensive solution.

There is a difference between mechanical determinism and libertarian determinism in their denial of moral responsibility.

Mechanistic determinism holds that human behavior is controlled by physical and biochemical processes, and that individuals do not have real choice and autonomy, so moral responsibility does not exist. Because if we act under a set set of physical rules, we can't make any real choices. This means that a criminal cannot really be blamed for prudence, because he will inevitably take the action he takes.

Libertarism, on the other hand, holds that human beings are free to choose their actions, and because of this autonomy, people should take full responsibility for any decisions they make. In this way, if a perpetrator selectively chooses to commit a crime, then he should be held accountable for his actions and bear the corresponding consequences.

Thus, although moral responsibility is not one of the central issues or foundational theories in the view of mechanical determinism or libertarism, it is true that they are interpreted differently depending on the way they are interpreted.

Materialism uses a mechanical (mechanical, physical) point of view to explain the objective world and subjective cognition of various problems. Mechanistic theory holds that life is entirely material, and there is no mysterious "vitality" at all, but it sees life as a complex machine. In the 17th century, the French scientist Descartes (1596-1650) first proposed that "animals are machines";In the 18th century, the French physician Lametelli (1709-0751) further proposed that "man is nothing but an upright walking machine".

At that time, people often compared the organs of the body to different machines: the heart was the pump, the lungs and diaphragm were bellows, the teeth and stomach were grinding discs, the bones and joints were levers, and so on. This mechanistic view of life holds that there is no essential distinction between life and non-life, and that life phenomena are also mechanical phenomena that can be explained entirely by the laws of mechanics and physics.

With the progress of modern natural science, people have found that many basic characteristics of life, such as metabolism, genetic variation, etc., seem to be explained by the laws of physics and chemistry, so the mechanism theory has developed into reductionism. Reductionism believes that the laws of life movement can be reduced to physical and chemical laws, and some cannot be reduced at present, because the research is not deep enough, and with the progress of science in the future, it can be reduced after all. At present, due to the rapid development of molecular biology, some natural scientists believe in reductionism.

However, the reductionist view is incomplete, and it completely equates the lower and higher forms of material motion.

What is mechanical materialism? From the perspective of the history of philosophy, mechanical materialism has several significant characteristics: 1. The existence of the world is mechanical motion.

The laws of any being, including humans, animals, and others, are mechanical. In other words, in the words of Lametelli, the outstanding representative of mechanical materialism of the eighteenth century, "man is a machine" and "animals are a machine."