Arbitrariness
Arbitrariness is the quality of being "determined by chance, whim, or impulse, and not by necessity, reason, or principle". It is also used to refer to a choice made without any specific criterion or restraint.[1]
Arbitrary decisions are not necessarily the same as
Philosophy
Arbitrary actions are closely related to
Nihilism is the philosophy that believes that there is no purpose in the universe, and that every choice is arbitrary.[2] According to nihilism, the universe contains no value and is essentially meaningless. Because the universe and all of its constituents contain no higher goal for us to make subgoals from, all aspects of human life and experiences are completely arbitrary. There is no right or wrong decision, thought or practice and whatever choice a human being makes is just as meaningless and empty as any other choice he or she could have made.[3]
Many brands of
Arbitrariness is also related to ethics, the philosophy of decision-making. Even if a person has a goal, they may choose to attempt to achieve it in ways that may be considered arbitrary. Rationalism holds that knowledge comes about through intellectual calculation and deduction; many rationalists (though not all) apply this to ethics as well. All decisions should be made through reason and logic, not via whim or how one "feels" what is right. Randomness may occasionally be acceptable as part of a subtask in furtherance of a larger goal, but not in general.
In semiotics, the general theory of signs, sign systems, and sign processes, Saussure introduced the notion of arbitrariness according to which there is no necessary connection between the material sign (or signifier), and the entity it refers to or denotes as its meaning (or signified) as a mental concept or real object.
Linguistics
The principle of semiotic arbitrariness refers to the idea that
Mathematics
A logical symbol is a fundamental concept in logic, tokens of which may be marks or a configuration of marks which form a particular pattern.
In mathematics, arbitrary corresponds to the term "any" and the universal quantifier , as in an arbitrary division of a set or an arbitrary permutation of a sequence. Its use implies generality and that a statement does not only apply to special cases, but that one may select any available choice and the statement will still hold. For example, one might say that:
- "Given an arbitrary integer, multiplying it by two will result in an even number."
Even further, the implication of the use of "arbitrary" is that generality will hold—even if an opponent were to choose the item in question. In which case, arbitrary can be regarded as synonymous to worst-case.[5]
Law
Arbitrary comes from the Latin arbitrarius, the source of arbiter; someone who is tasked to judge some matter.[6] An arbitrary legal judgment is a decision made at the discretion of the judge, not one that is fixed by law.[7][1] In some countries, a prohibition of arbitrariness is enshrined into the constitution. Article 9 of the Swiss Federal Constitution theoretically overrides even democratic decisions in prohibiting arbitrary government action.[8] The US Supreme Court has overturned laws for having "no rational basis." A recent study of the U.S. asylum system suggests that arbitrariness in decision-making might be the cause of large disparities in outcomes between different adjudicators, a phenomenon described as refugee roulette.
Article 330 of the Russian penal code defines arbitrariness as a specific crime, but with a very broad definition encompassing any "actions contrary to the order presented by a law".[9]
See also
References
- ^ a b "arbitrariness". Retrieved 21 April 2018 – via The Free Dictionary.
- ^ Magnus, Bernd (1971). "Nihilism, Reason, and "The Good"." The Review of Metaphysics. 25 (2):292–310.
- ^ "Nihilism". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 2019-11-19.
- ^ Chandler, Daniel. "Semiotics for Beginners". visual-memory.co.uk. Retrieved 2019-11-19.
- ^ Tel, Gérard (2000). Introduction to distributed algorithms. Cambridge University Press. p. 245.
- ^ Online Etymology Dictionary: "'deciding by one's own discretion,' from L. arbitrarius, from arbiter (see arbiter). The original meaning gradually to mean ‘capricious’ (1646) and ‘despotic’ (1642).”
- ^ Curtis, Thomas. The London Encyclopaedia, page 565 (1829): “Arbitrary, and the words more immediately connected with it, signify that the decision of the arbiter is made in consequence of his own uncontrolled will, or in consequence of reasons which do not appear.”
- ^ Federal Constitution of the Swiss Federation Archived 2015-04-18 at the Wayback Machine. The Federal Authorities of the Swiss Confederation.
- ^ "Article 330. Arbitrariness". The Criminal Code Of The Russian Federation.
Arbitrariness, that is the unauthorized commission of actions contrary to the order presented by a law or any other normative legal act,
External links
- The dictionary definition of arbitrary at Wiktionary