Moral Behavior and Autism

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http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/24602/page1/

This article shows an example of autistics not judging moral behavior by intention. I wonder if it isn't because we have been judged all our lives by our behavior, not intention? They are assuming it's a "brain thing" when it could be a socialized thing.

Yes.
This is why I hate things like war, because it focuses on intention, rather than outcome.
This is very nice for me, because I have always thought in this way.
If A gave B arsenic, A would still have to go to jail, but there should be pending research into who put the arsenic in the bowl (or in the box at home or in the box at the factory etc.).
But when I read these things I feel like I am lying to myself, because I think if I am aware of it, I have to change it.

There are many instances and situations where NT's directly link morality to outcome. Most of the adult world is about dealing with the often unintended consequences of your actions. Ultimately evolution is not concerned with what you "intended".

This kind of ethical debate would be way to complex for even highly advanced NT children

Most NT adults do not understand the situational; contextual nature of morality even when they hold a doctorate in the subject.

(edited due to not comprehending correctly the first time)

I don't really think it proves a whole lot because I know a lot of NTs that will only look for outcome. "Oh well, no one got hurt, so it doesn't matter." But to me, it matters very much so if someone did something wrong regardless of whether or not anyone got hurt.

That is one of the reasons I don't lie. Because it's simply ill-intent a lot of the time. The outcome is secondary reason not to-because something bad could happen if I do. But I don't think about that first.

Same with theft... if I really wanted to think about it, it's out in the open, I could take this and no one would know. I just don't do it because it's not right. Nevermind the fact that whoever I stole from would then be missing it or anything like that, or that I might get in trouble. I just wouldn't do it from the start.

In the arsenic scenario... no, he isn't morally responsible, because his intention was JUST to pass the sugar... which was something good to do for someone. Now, if he watched the person put arsenic in it and passed it anyway, then yes, he very much did something wrong. If he had no clue... man, of all the times I've tried to do a good deed to have it backfire in my face... he's going to get in trouble anyway, but he didn't do it intentionally.

At least I've learned one new thing from this though... NEVER pass the sugar.

If A really did not know and could not possibly have known it was arsenic then I can't see how anyone could say he was guilty

I think outcome still matters more than intention.

I must say, upon thinking about it for a while, it's quite funny, because outcome would ultimately matter to those people anyway, the ones who all said intention was more important.

The only reason they said the guy didn't do anything wrong was because they knew for sure... but, if they hadn't seen that, but walked in on the situation of the outcome, that guy would be looked up and down as a downright murderer no matter what reasons he gave. No one would believe him, because they didn't see what happened.

Later on, sure, it might would change as more facts came out, but if they walked in on that scene, they'd cuff him and take him to jail, no questions asked. Chances are, even after he was proven innocent in court, it would be split down the middle-half would still think he was guilty somehow.

When they catch someone doing something, they never ask "did you intend to do something wrong?" before throwing them in the cell.

Maybe we don't understand the question in the way it was phrased.

When faced with a question like this some of us have a number of related ancillary questions launched into orbit which need answering before we can reach a conclusion.

Most of us are probably thinking did the question mean "if the bowl hadn't been passed would child B still be alive?"

However we probably realize

This is not the same as asking "did child A walk into the cafe with arsenic and put it in the sugar bowl having first run a set of visualizations though his or her head in order to determine the possible outcomes. Have first run those visualization and then chosen the one which showed in (cinematic quality) the consequences of putting arsenic in the bowl would result in the death of child B."

A Child A didn't bring any arsenic

Child A didn't run any visualizations




Child A had no intention of killing child B .


But

if the sugar bowl hadn't been passed Child B would still be alive.

These are the two answers to the same question.

All NT's do is shorten "Did Child A intend to kill child B?"- to "Did child A kill child B ?" and illogically expect us to pick up this dual meaning.

I think that the way this is supposed to work is that you are expected to put yourself in the position of person A. You would see that if you were in that position you would have no way of knowing about the arsenic. Its a theory of mind thing?

How can you put yourself into the " mind " of something as abstract as Child A ? It has no described "mind" nor qualities of one.

Child A has no described points of reference to give it "position" into which we can put ourselves.
How can we locate what we are supposed to model if there no location references.

This Child A / Child B is dumb question to ask us basically.

Being deliberately Aspi here if you didn't already get that.

Do you like bears?

Only discovered Aspi humor last week by visiting here.