Does free will exist?

[Galacticdefender]

I think there is most definitely free will. I am typing this right now of my own accord, am I not? I think just the fact that we can discuss wether or not we have free will is evidence enough that we do.

 

[Parson]

Or that the way we came to be who are makes it inevitable that we would discuss this.

This is fun, but really just an endless circle of logic.

 

[Huttman]

An endless circle can be symbolic of something that goes nowhere and never finds the answer or is an all encompassing understanding. Semantics. There is a satisfying truth and answer to EVERY question or puzzle in existence. I do not doubt we are of our own accord to go left or right. Some might say, (e.g.) since I cannot survive without air, water or proper sustenance, I do not have free will. I believe there are many ways to look at issues that come up. That being said, I'm sure a proper psychologist, knowing it's a circle reasoning thing, would be more interested in why someone feels they don't have free will while others do feel they do. Even God, for those of you who do believe, has set a law for himself and exists in it perfectly. You have heard the term, with great power comes great responsibility, and it is true. Without restraint, there would be chaos. Actually, without it, nothing would exist.

I guess the real question would be, not does free will exist, but, are you happy with the free will you possess?

 

[Parson]

An endless circle can be symbolic of something that goes nowhere and never finds the answer or is an all encompassing understanding.

You are now sounding like your avatar.

Semantics. There is a satisfying truth and answer to EVERY question or puzzle in existence.

Perhaps, but I have nodoubt that there are many questions to which I, and I will be so bold as to say humanity will never find a satisfying answer to.

I do not doubt we are of our own accord to go left or right. Some might say, (e.g.) since I cannot survive without air, water or proper sustenance, I do not have free will. I believe there are many ways to look at issues that come up. That being said, I'm sure a proper psychologist, knowing it's a circle reasoning thing, would be more interested in why someone feels they don't have free will while others do feel they do. Even God, for those of you who do believe, has set a law for himself and exists in it perfectly. You have heard the term, with great power comes great responsibility, and it is true. Without restraint, there would be chaos. Actually, without it, nothing would exist.

I guess the real question would be, not does free will exist, but, are you happy with the free will you possess?

As a Christian of Calvinist persuasion I find your last sentence very insightful. And certainly the truth of "with great power comes great responsibility" is transparent to anyone who values the benefits of human community.

 

[HareBrain]

A series of simple propositions:

1. What we call conscious decisions are thoughts.

2. Although these thoughts are based on previous thoughts, in chains that we might call a decision-making process, we do not decide to have any individual thought. The thoughts happen without us calling them forth.

3. If these individual thoughts are not called forth by our own volition, if we do not choose to think them, then how can any decision that happens at the end of a chain of thought be said to be one made by free will?

To expand: anyone who's ever tried meditating knows that thoughts just arise in the mind; you don't call them, they just come, seemingly randomly (but actually based on a large number of factors in brain activity).

You can say to yourself "I'll think about what to have for dinner", but that thought itself wasn't called forth, wasn't decided upon; you just had it, because it was getting near dinner time, you were hungry, etc. Think about it: you cannot describe the process by which you decide to think about what to have for dinner except by starting with a thought that arises spontaneously. And then this leads to a chain of thoughts that makes up the decision -- but each of these thoughts itself arises spontaneously, the result of brain activity driven by previous thoughts/brain activity. And what we might call the final thought in this process, which is the actual decision about what to eat, itself arises spontaneously. The decision has been made for you by wherever the thoughts come from. Which is "you" in the wider sense, of course, but not the narrower "you" that observes them arising: the conscious self.

Except for instinctive reactions, you cannot make a decision that is not a thought, and you cannot decide to have any thought. You just have them. Your observation of the process, and identification with it, is what creates the illusion of conscious free will.

 

[Gordian Knot]

It is an interesting argument HB. I do have some issues though. One is you make it sound as though thoughts come from some nebulous limbo. Or to use your words "The decision has been made for you by wherever the thoughts come from."

The thoughts had to come from your brain right? Unless you are under the evil control of Emperor Zogg! If your thoughts came to your consciousness out of your brain, Ergo, ipso, facto, Colombo, Orio, are they not by definition "your" thoughts?

If they are indeed your thoughts, the conclusion that results is your decision.

 

[Ursa major]

I'm guessing that one can, at least to some extent, train one's subconscious to supply certain thoughts (or type of thoughts) to one's conscious mind.

Many years ago, I had no interest in coming up with puns, and neither did my subconscious. Now puns frequently appear in my head unbidden, because it's what my subconscious has been "trained" to do (presumably because reacting, and adapting, to the conscious mind's desires/"requests" is how at least part of the subconscious mind works).

 

[Huttman]

I was going to put this in my previous post but I did not want to over do my point I was going to say about having choice to go left or right is still very much about stimuli. This worlds economics flourish through a subtle and gross bombardment of advertising and chemically enhanced stimuli. But we have a choice to say no to that cupcake! Freewill and serenity now!

Seriously, the ability to choose is a precious thing. You could say it is a gift. The desire to go against the popular has truly made the most monumental changes in this world, even if it was for just one person.

 

[HareBrain]

If your thoughts came to your consciousness out of your brain, Ergo, ipso, facto, Colombo, Orio, are they not by definition "your" thoughts?

If they are indeed your thoughts, the conclusion that results is your decision.

In my post above I said this (perhaps not clearly enough), but I make the distinction between "you" as an overall person (including the unconscious) and the "you" that I think is what most people instinctively mean by the conscious self, which I maintain to be the observer of the results of brain activity rather than its controller.

 

[Moonbat]

It sounds to me that HB is proposing a difference between Conscious Free Will and Subconscious Free Will. this is not an argument against free will but more whether it is driving or a passenger.

Many years ago, I had no interest in coming up with puns,

I thought this was the beginning of a Pun addicts confession, possibly a family intervention had occurred.

We have been discussing this for a while now and I think we have gone round several times, but due to the causal nature of time it is nigh on impossible to every know if a choice is free or not, and some of the science (possibly alluded to earlier in the thread) suggests that, as HB says, the choices are not something the conscious 'you/I' is aware of placing the freedom of our will firmly in the subconscious.

If we agree that free will is Subconcious and as Ursa mentioned the ability to train our subconscious is possible, where does that leave us?

 

[HareBrain]

It sounds to me that HB is proposing a difference between Conscious Free Will and Subconscious Free Will. this is not an argument against free will but more whether it is driving or a passenger.

I think "subconscious free will" is a contradiction in terms. What would separate our "subconscious free will" from that of an amoeba? It would be no more "free" than a rock that falls because it is pulled by gravity. (We are rocks who believe we choose to fall.)

We have been discussing this for a while now and I think we have gone round several times

Actually, though this thread has gone round and round, I've found it useful in making me think ("me" in the wider sense of course), and my opinion has changed since it started. I used to believe that true free will might be possible if we could only rid our decision-making of the effects of unconscious elements (genetics and past experience). Now, since I observe that all thought arises unconsciously, I don't think there's any possibility of it at all. (Nor do I think it much matters except as a philosophical point.)

If we agree that free will is Subconcious and as Ursa mentioned the ability to train our subconscious is possible, where does that leave us?

It leaves us as automata who don't experience ourselves as automata. Our conscious selves are observers along for the ride. But the fact that we don't (and possibly can't) experience ourselves as automata is crucial -- if we did, it would be psychologically devastating.

The interesting question that arises from this, I think, is what is the "observer" and why do we have it, if it has no effect on our actions?

 

[Ursa major]

It leaves us as automata who don't experience ourselves as automata. Our conscious selves are observers along for the ride. But the fact that we don't (and possibly can't) experience ourselves as automata is crucial -- if we did, it would be psychologically devastating.

It seems to me that we are automata, however our decision-making process works:

• by making our own decisions (conscious mind and/or subconscious mind), based, at least partly, on external stimuli88
• by following a programme (predestination;
• by receiving commands (from a separate soul*** or a deity***).

I think we lose the sense of whichever form our decision-making is in operation simply because:

1. we have a conscious mind, that appears to be, for all intents and purposes, single threaded, but doesn't always follow what we might regard as logical thinking, the latter because:
2. the massive parallelism of our brains provides so many different logical arguments that we cannot determine all of the consideration that have gone towards the final decision. And, for some reason, we seem to think of the normal human brain as a "perfect" machine, which seems both illogical (very few things are or can be perfect) and misguided (because the brain is an analogue system, one to which Boolean logic probably can't easily be applied.)

Possibly.

The interesting question that arises from this, I think, is what is the "observer" and why do we have it, if it has no effect on our actions?

Many believe that this is merely an emergent property of our brains, which is why some people think that, eventually, IT systems will achieve consciousness.



** - I know that this doesn't sound like the usual definition of an automaton, but if our brain isn't following (its own) "instructions" (low level ones, at the neuron level, out of which bigger ones emerge), including instructions to rewrite instructions, what is it doing?

*** - All this does is move the ground on which the argument plays out; it doesn't change the argument (except to allow some people to say we've entered one or more areas of ineffability).

 

[Gordian Knot]

In my post above I said this (perhaps not clearly enough), but I make the distinction between "you" as an overall person (including the unconscious) and the "you" that I think is what most people instinctively mean by the conscious self, which I maintain to be the observer of the results of brain activity rather than its controller.

Actually I did understand what you were saying. My interpretation is different. The mechanisms by which the conscious and the subconscious function are indeed different. Don't think many would debate that point. I believe different is good though!

Saying the conscious mind is just an observer is, in my opinion, not giving that part of our active thought process its just due. Similarly suggesting that the subconscious drives all smacks of passing the buck. It is the modern equivalent of "The Devil made me do it" in the sense that we are saying our actions are processed on a level for which we have no control.

In actuality I tend to lean towards the concept that the neither is in complete control; rather that both work side by side to allow us to make our decisions. Or in your words, both participate in the "control" of how decisions will be made. The conscious mind brings in stimuli, the unconscious parses that stimuli and passes suggestions back out to the conscious mind.

As for the comment that we have gone round and round on this issue, my question would be what's your point? Philosophical topics are by nature, inherently difficult to pin down as there are precious few solid truths to work from. Going round and round is not an effort in futility however. Each trip around the discussion brings out different ideas, different suggestions.

In other words, it is the journey that is the point, not the destination.

 

[HareBrain]

Saying the conscious mind is just an observer is, in my opinion, not giving that part of our active thought process its just due. Similarly suggesting that the subconscious drives all smacks of passing the buck. It is the modern equivalent of "The Devil made me do it" in the sense that we are saying our actions are processed on a level for which we have no control.

I agree that buck-passing in not very attractive, but the attractiveness or otherwise of an idea has no bearing on how true it is (whatever Keats said).

In actuality I tend to lean towards the concept that the neither is in complete control; rather that both work side by side to allow us to make our decisions. Or in your words, both participate in the "control" of how decisions will be made. The conscious mind brings in stimuli, the unconscious parses that stimuli and passes suggestions back out to the conscious mind.

How does the conscious mind bring in stimuli? How does it do anything with the suggestions passed to it by the unconscious?

I maintain that to show the conscious has anything to do with our actions, either one of these would have to be the case:

1. Our decisions are not wholly dependent on thought (or instinct), or

2. We can choose which thoughts arise in our conscious minds.**

My observation of my own mental activity suggests both those are false. I'm willing to be shown to be wrong, but I'd like to see these particular points tackled (or the preceding assumption).


** This is a tricky one. I could think "I will next think of a blue elephant", and think of a blue elephant. But I would say this is a chain of thoughts, each arising from the unconscious into the conscious, but influenced by the previous ones.