Me: "Should the wise man be held accountable for his actions? If so, he has free choice. If not, there is no basis for punishing him."

hmk: "First of all, if the querent didn't learn anything from this endeavor, then the wise man is hardly "wise."

Secondly, there are reasons to take action against the old man that fit with a deterministic paradigm. The old man is insane, and needs some help for his own good. The old man is also a likely danger to others, and needs to be "corrected," however that is to take place.

As for your concept of punishment, there is no reason to bring further suffering to the old man unless it does a requisite amount of good for him, and more importantly, others.

I don't see determinism as nihilistic or in any way an excuse to get out of personal responsibility. Quite the contrary. A sensible person who realises the relationship between cause and effect should realize also an increased sense of power and control, and accordingly strive for what is in his best interests."

I only meant for my question to be hypothetical. The wise man should not really be punished, because it was only a demonstration. The guy who asked the question is supposed to reason this in his head:

"He is harming me. I am angry. Should he be punished for what he is doing? Yes. Why would I even ask this question if people don't have free choice? Would I punish a snake for biting me? No. Why then does a human deserve punishment? Because he has free choice."

The use of punsishment here is only to illustrate an example. Punishment comes later in reasoning as a solution to the problem.

Okay, so is it still possible that we don't have free choice? That we don't determine our actions, but some hidden force does? I said before that I think we are partly influenced by the subconscious chain of experiences and sense perceptions. But that only influences our decisions; it doesn't make them for us.

Think about everyday experiences. Do you think something else is making decisions for you? If you do, then you would have zero responsibility for your actions (and that doesn't have to be in the moral sense.)