Norwegian

Not to start a conflict here, but I really don`t think that a phenomenon like "personal responsibility" really exist. Just to put it in a little perspective. For personal responsibility to exist, man have to have some kind of will, that somehow can make choices that are not governed by external forces, and the decisions a person acutally take have to be a direct result of this will. I really don`t think that this idea is physically feasible. We have two ideas of how the laws that govern nature works. We have tradtional physics where everything is cause and effect. This set of laws does not allow any kind of free will or personal responsibility, because every action a human being takes are the direct effect of a long chain of cause and effect relationships. We know that these laws in part govern human action, so "complete free will" is simply not feasible. There are some that hovewer claim that quantum physics gives an exception to this law, but I don`t agree that this causes personal responsibilty to exist, because quantum physics is believed to be pure chance. If something is pure chance, nothing is the direct cause of it, and therefore noone can be "responsible" for it.

Also, since I am norwegian, I guess I`m one of those who are regarded as being "anti american". I surely don`t feel that way. There really is only one aspect of american society that many european disagree with, and that is that americans seems somewhat "uncaring", which that little essay clearly appears in the eyes of someone who are from northwestern Europe. We really don`t see why the richest most powerful and most sophisticated country in the world, should have some of the worst social and poverty problems of the entire rich world. Not to start a fight here, I just attempt to state the opposite postionn.