Free Will - What Is It and Does It Exist?
 

From another thread, this fascinating subject arose.

Does free will exist? Can the actions of people ever be accurately predicted 100% of the time? If there was enough computing power and underlying data, could we ever predict the future with accuracy? Do we have a choice about what we do, or is it predetermined? If free will does exist, is it limited to humans?

There are probably dozens more questions.

Let's start with the one Michael Chui asked me: Wordnet Princeton defines free will this way: the power of making free choices unconstrained by external agencies
It defines choice (in this context) as: the act of choosing or selecting

To me, free will is the ability to choose freely, even randomly, whenever I want. By this definition (if we can agree upon it) it is the opposite of determinism. In other words, the future is unpredictable. It would be impossible to predict with 100% accuracy what's going to happen tomorrow because people (at least) have the ability to change their minds and actions at will.

Anybody have a better definition?

I don't believe free will actually exists for most. Were all so influenced, programmed, and most of us have entity attachments controlling over our thoughts/actions. How can you have free will when we've all been treated like toys since being born into this world.

A person wanting to buy a diet coke, might think they have free will to buy it or not to buy it. But the programming of coke commercials are deep. They might not really want a coke, but they feel like they need one. Where's the free will in that situation?


You have to bypass the mind-control, programming, influences, and get rid of the entity attachments to find free will.

One unpredictablility that guides many people: spiritual influence.

I don't think science can predetermine spiritual influence.

Human tendencies based upon situations, can possibly be predicted to some degree. But people following a 'message' they've received - it may be forever beyond our science - unless technology becomes so advanced that we can interpret any and all energy fluctuations and modulations including those from 'the other side'.

Free Will within the Matrix
 

If we are really programmed through a socialization process (which we are) then many of our behaviors are running on automatic based on previously embedded beliefs.

In that case we don't have free will, we just get to think we do. It's much like the movie the Matrix. Do the people dreaming in the Matrix have free will? No.

Neo didn't have Free Will until he broke free from his previously installed program. (read Belief System)

Then it isn't an intellectual question of whether we have Free Will. The question is whether we will fight to get it back.

I don't think the fact of free will in itself entails we are inherently unpredictable. Obviously we can predict to a certain extent what people will do. We can predict that a poor person, on spotting a £50 note lying on the street, will pick it up and put it in his pocket. And the more and more we get to know a person, the more we will probably be able to predict his or her behaviour. We might imagine if we were to completely understand the essence of a person, understand everything that that person is, and we had an unlimited intelligence and knowledge of the environment, that we might be able to perfectly predict that person's behaviour. However that would not effect his free will one iota.

What does free will mean? I really want to know what determinism means. It seems to me that I'm the only person in the Universe who doesn't know what it means. But what free will means is much easier.

We tend to think of our behaviour as being a result of our desires and intentions. Thus for example, in waking up in the morning, I might have the choice of having either porridge, or eggs and bacon for breakfast. I am immediately aware of having the power to choose which to have. I might choose eggs and bacon because I prefer the taste. Or I might choose porridge, maybe not because I prefer the taste, but because I am concerned with my weight or health. But whatever I choose it seems for all the world that it is my choice, and it is ultimately my choice even though I might be heavily influenced in making one choice or the other. Thus I may have no problems with my health and weight, have no ethical problems with eating meat, and vastly prefer the taste of eggs and bacon. Therefore it would seem I have no reason to choose to eat porridge for breakfast and every reason to eat eggs and bacon instead. Yet, notwithstanding all of this, I nevertheless still appear to have the power to choose to eat porridge. This power to choose between alternatives is what we refer to as free will.

However, if we are to consider ourselves as being the same characteristic type of thing as any other physical thing or process, then, on the face of it, we have a difficulty here. We intuitively suppose that the vast preponderance of physical processes in the Universe are not accompanied by any conscious awareness. Thus for example, we tend to suppose that a boulder rolling down a hill, the planets which orbit the Sun and so on, unlike us, do not have accompanying mental experiences. Hence there is no question of such physical processes having any free will. It merely requires the application of physical laws to completely understand their behaviour. Take the example of the Earth orbiting the Sun. We suppose that the Sun’s gravitational field constrains the Earth to follow a circular path around the Sun. Indeed, in the absence of any other forces, we would consider it miraculous if it took any other path.

In contrast we appear to be in direct control of much of our behaviour. It might be extremely unusual indeed for me to make the choice to eat porridge for breakfast; indeed it might be unprecedented. But it would scarcely be considered to be miraculous! This underscores the notion that it seems that I am never compelled to behave or choose in a given manner. It seems I have the power to choose to eat porridge rather than eggs and bacon, even in the absence of any good reasons for so choosing, and even if inevitably I never do so. This power of choice (if it exists) is what is meant by free will.

First response is off-topic. Dictionaries annoy me when talking about definitions. See this video for more information.

Now, more directly,

Choice is, we can agree, the act of choosing or selecting. Substituting its definition into the definition of free will, we get "the power of making free actions of choosing or selecting unconstrained by external agencies".

I have two problems with this.

1) "choice" was not the only inexact term used in the original definition. "unconstrained" is also undefined, as is "external" and "agency", which are separate concepts. Furthermore, "power" remains undefined. I'm sure that we can reach mutually agreeable definitions to each of these terms, but right now, they're undefined because we haven't agreed.

2) If choice is the act of choosing or selecting, there are two questions the demand answering. One is, "Choosing or selecting from what set of possible options?" The other is, "Choosing or selecting on what basis?"

1) Define "freedom"?
2) Define "random"?
3) Define "I"?
4) Define "want"?

Define "will"?

Please don't feel obligated to respond to every little point I'm making in this post; I'd be fine with working with smaller bite-size pieces at a time.

Would you agree, then, that free will is the expression of a consciousness that has forgotten the ego?

But how does it guide people?

But if free will is the capacity to make choice itself, does a person without free will have the option to fight back?

Determinism is the philosophy that the future is determinable. More clearly, that it is possible to determine what the future holds based on events of the past. Thus, our ignorance is not a problem of capability, but rather a problem of information and processing.

According to Wikipedia, there are two types of determinists: those who believe that free will is incompatible with determinism, and those who believe it isn't. I am of the latter camp. To quote from Wikipedia,

"The compatibilist definition of free will states that free will is not the ability to choose as an agent independent of prior cause, but as an agent who is not forced to make a certain choice."

Alternatively, InJoy's position is remarkably similar to what Wikipedia calls Libertarian:

"Libertarianism suggests that we actually do have free will, that it is incompatible with determinism, and that therefore the future is not determined."

Article quoted was: Compatibilism and incompatibilism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia as found through the Determinism article.

I agree that we're all influenced and somewhat programmed but we still have the ability to make choices, be aware and "think critically" instead of blindly following someone else's lead.

Well, based on an exhaustive knowledge of the present state of the Universe I would imagine. But in what sense does the present state of the Universe inevitably lead to a specific future state? Does determinism view physical laws as governing reality rather than merely describing reality? And what about free will? Such a definition of free will is clearly not logically incompatible with this definition of determinism, and yet people tend to think they are logically incompatible.

Presumably it doesn't just mean prior physical causes but mental causes too. But then we have the problem of defining what exactly a mental cause is and what is meant by saying we behave due to mental causes or alternatively that we behave due to no causes at all, either physical or mental.

{shrugs} I think that this whole subject is extremely confused. What I'm interested in are the people who deny the existence of mental causal powers. That's the issue that should be addressed before discussing "free will". It seems to me that materialists, and more generally those who believe that mental events simply follow physical events in the brain, are unable to believe in mental causation.

That feels wholly nonsensical to me. Governance is the management of a population by a subset of that same population. It demands sentience and control, neither of which are possessed by "physical laws". We don't say that the commutative property of arithmetic governs addition simply because 1 + 2 = 2 + 1. It's not having a say-so over arithmetic: it's just a generalized observation.

The word "law" has never been a good choice in science. There's a poetic flair to it that's annoyingly ambiguous in today's postmodern society.

And yet, there is no evidence that human beings, or anything else, are progenitors of cause. It is fairly well-established that human beings do not appear out of thin air: they are born and raised. They are effects of a cause, known as reproduction. Previous to this, it is postulated that they are effects of a different cause: evolution. Evolution is presumed to be the effect of abiogenesis, or whatever the fashionable theory is today, which is in turn a result of atmospheric effects which resulted from the coalescence of some nebula's space dust into a solar system, which probably came from some half-crazed phenomenon we like to call the Big Bang.

We are made of star stuff, as Carl Sagan says. It says nothing about consciousness. Nothing about choice. Only predictability, that it is possible to determine the cause of actions.

I would recommend looking up the literature on mind-altering drugs. I've never read the stuff myself, but I think that would be a good source to discover that mental functions can be altered by very physical actions. That hardly seals the case: it does not suggest that all mental functions are sourced from physical changes. But it's a starting point.

To measure Free Will
 

How to measure Free Will

First Test: Quiet your mind. Be still and listen to the silence. Sustain this state for a while.

If you can not quiet your mind you do not have control over it. It goes around disturbing your peace and quiet. If there is unwanted chatter in your head then you are not free to enjoy the moment.

Here is a more serious test: Exercise your will to create the emotion of gratitude, or love, or any other emotion in the spectrum of happiness. Keep it going for the day. Even keep it going for the week. Do you have the will power to do so?

Does something distract your attention and upset your emotions?

If you are not able to choose your emotions through out the day or quiet your mind then what is doing the choosing?

When you realize you don't have choices over these simple, yet vital issues of your happiness you can either ignore it, or take up the fight to reclaim your will power over your mind and emotional state.

Allow me to clarify. Take gravitational force. We tend to think this as being a real force, or in other words there is this existent called gravitational force which constrains the Earth to orbit the Sun and compels objects near the Earths surface to fall. More generally all physical change in the world is the result of real existing forces. So physical laws, or at least the forces described by physical laws, constrain reality to behave as it does. And of course physical causation refers to real causes existing in nature. When one snooker ball hits another the second ball moves due to the innate power of the impact of the first ball.

On the other hand arguably "physical laws" are simply a description of the unfolding of events. In this case the word "law" is inappropriate. Something like gravity would then just simply be a means to mathematically describe physical processes in the world. But of course in this case we have no explanation of why physical processes unfold the way they do. We can't say the Earth orbits the Sun due to gravity since all physical laws are merely descriptive.

I don't see this as being a problem at all though. But it does have interesting implications for the free will debate. Thus I would argue that we are immediately acquainted with our own causal agency. But in this case mental causation and physical causation are of 2 entirely differing natures. Only mental causation refers to a real causal power existing in nature. In this case there cannot be any question that we have free will unless one means by "free will" something obscure.

I think this is absolutely wrong. We have no evidence that anything physical is a real progenitor of cause (although it could be a useful metaphysical hypothesis). But I suggest we are directly acquainted with our own causal agency. Indeed to deny this is to embrace epiphenomenalism and I would argue that epiphenomenalism is incoherent (I can provide this argument if you wish).

Our physical bodies are, but we are not the same as our physical bodies.

Our physical bodies are.

The hypothesis that consciousness is wholly produced by physical processes is suggested by mind/brain correlations certainly. But it certainly doesn't entail this hypothesis, and there is a great deal of evidence and many reasons to doubt it. (I won't go into them at this point as it would take me 10's of thousands of words!)

Reminds of a technique used by Lawyers that know they will lose. Bring in as much minutiae as you possibly can, for the express purpose of Delaying and confusing.

Michael.
We all know what the above terms mean.
Let's move on, shall we?

Which came first? The law or the reality? Perhaps you should read Newton's book, before you assume that he waved his hand and consigned all of reality to his laws of motion.

Correct. We can't. However, the explanation is based on the evidence at hand, contingent upon the awareness that the explanation could always be wrong. It's a theory. It's a very nice theory, but it remains only a theory.

For instance, gravity does not explain why the Earth orbits the Sun at all. It explains why the Earth does not fly away from the Sun. It does not suggest why the Earth started orbiting in the first place.

Then let us drop physical causation and explore mental causation. Tell me about it. What is it?

I hold the term "free will" to be interchangeable with "choice".

You're making assertions without argument; provide the argument, please, and explain what it is while you're doing so.

Starting with a thousand words at a time would be acceptable. Professing a surplus of knowledge is not an argument.

Thanks for the condescension. Let me show you what I see.

InJoy stated that, "free will is the ability to choose freely, even randomly, whenever I want."

What does "freely" mean? Freedom is a balance between restriction and expression. For expression to properly occur, it must first be restrained. You can express abstract thought on paper more powerfully through the constraint of an alphabet. Thus, to be free first means to be restricted. In which case, it must be asked, how is choice therefore restricted?

What does "randomly" mean? Randomness, as defined as a purely chaotic selection, does not occur in nature. It does not occur in computers. It does not occur in events. Randomness is a failure to perceive the order underlying the apparent chaos, not an expression of that chaos itself.

What does "I" mean? Where are the limits to who you are? Do you, by "I", refer to your body? Do you refer to Jung's collective unconsciousness? Do you refer to Steve's God-consciousness, or subjective reality? Are you considering just how extensive your self may, actually, be?

What does "want" mean? Want suggests a desire, but more pointedly, an inessential desire. In the definition provided, want is referred to in relation to the word "choice". Are you suggesting that choice is therefore inessential?

What does "will" mean? Will may refer to the strength of mind a person has, or it may refer to their sovereignty. In the former case, it is a passive attribute; in the latter, an active characteristic. If a person has the ability to change their mind at will, is this change passive or active?

But I suppose it is entirely wrong of me to ask first, and allow them to speak their mind--of their own free will--rather than to contaminate their thoughts first by introducing my own perspective into the discussion immediately, and so forcing them to include my ideas, which may be entirely wrong, in the conversation despite the fact that they initiated it by putting forward something to consider on the table.

And thanks for ignoring the fact that I asked InJoy to not feel obligated to answer every single one.

First of all you make it sound as if I subscribe to the position that physical laws govern. Please don't quote me out of context.

But to answer your question:

There's no purpose in reading Newton's book.

a) What he personally thought is not relevant

b) His principles does not address this question.

And neither came first. The Universe would presumably consist in both the material entities of reality and the laws governing the interaction of these material entities. You can't have one coming before the other.

What are you talking about? You seem to be talking about a scientific explanation where as I'm talking about the true metaphysical explanation. Your response is therefore a complete non-sequitur.

Don't be absurd. If it explains the latter than necessarily it explains the former. But under your metaphysical proposal that laws do not govern gravity actually explains nothing whatsoever. But I'm ok with that; it doesn't need to as I've already explained.

Our ability to voluntarily move our bodies.

Then you're not using the term in its correct sense.

1. If it were true that my consciousness is not causally efficacious and instead the totality of my behaviour is governed by physical laws, then my conviction that I am conscious is wholly caused by determined events in the brain which form links in a chain of physical cause and effect.

2. Thus my conviction that I am conscious has nothing to do with the fact that I am conscious since my consciousness is causally inefficacious. Instead, as stated, my conviction I am conscious is a result of the causal chain of physical cause and effect in the brain.

3) But I know without a shadow of a doubt that I am conscious since there is no distinction between seeming to be conscious and really being conscious. Moreover it is very clear that it is my consciousness which provides this incorrigible knowledge, for, if "I" were not conscious, "I" could not think "I" am, since, not being conscious, "I" could never actual think at all!

4) But now we have an internal inconsistency since, on the one hand, I have incorrigible certain knowledge that I am conscious, and yet, on the other hand, if all mental events simply follow physical events in the brain, I could logically be mistaken in thinking I am conscious.

5) Therefore we need to abandon the initial premise i.e that my consciousness is not causally efficacious.

I am unable to comprehend why you think it is an argument. The problem here is that you don't appear to understand a great deal of what I say. IN this you are in the same boat as the vast majority of skeptics. In addition I am not prepared to start lecturing on all topics under the Sun in this one thread.

No, you suggest that physical laws must govern if you are wrong. That's not true.

His book is a derivation of his laws. The laws of motion did not appear out of thin air. But you couldn't be expected to know that.

We seem to be talking about different meanings of "law", so I'll drop it.

Out of curiosity, where are the limits of your identity? What would it take for you to no longer be you?

Cool. That's awesome. You're totally the ace. I kowtow before your magnificence.

Aside from the bit about governing, then I agree.

Your conviction of consciousness has everything to do with the fact that you are conscious. Conviction necessarily arises from consciousness, so the physical causation from which arose consciousness in the first place may be extended to enable conviction.

Wow. You're asserting certain knowledge. I'll have to wrap my head around that for a moment.

Have you ever been wrong? Or are you always right?

Don't bring something up if you're not prepared to talk about it. You want to show off your knowledge? Then do it. Don't flash it like a police badge and expect me to assume the position. If it's not relevant, don't mention it.

That's enlightening. That's what always happens, skeptics assuring me I'm wrong but never attempting to back up their assertions.

What are you babbling on about?? Why are you talking about Newton at all? What has Newton got to do with the price of tea in China??

No, we were both talking about physical laws and you keep going off on a tangent and not remotely addressing any points I make.

If I cease to exist or become one with others.


Of course. Assuming otherwise leads to a logical absurdity. That's my whole argument, it's a Reductio ad absurdum. Therefore mental causality must necessarily exist, at least for that one thought "I know with incorrigible certitude that I am conscious".

*I* didn't bring it up. You asserted that it is extremely likely that consciousness is a product of the brain. I replied that there is a great deal of evidence and many reasons to doubt it. Look to the evidence suggesting survival. Consider the transmission theory of the mind/brain relationship. I'm not prepared to go into it in this thread which is about free will. If you're interested go and do your own homework.


BTW unless you say anything substantive in your reply, then I won't be responding. I don't mind if you don't understand me. Just let me know and I'll attempt to explain. But I don't see the point in responding to you when you either go off on a tangent or ask me to provide arguments which you never disagreed with in the first place!

Yes, mental causality exists. It is an extension of physical causality.

1) Physical causality is the source of consciousness.
2) Consciousness is the source of mental causality.
3) Mental causality is the source of the conviction of consciousness.
4) Thus, physical casuality is the source of the conviction of consciousness.

Which part did I get wrong?

Fine, fine. You are right, and I am wrong. It must be obvious, and I must be a blind idiot not to see it. I repent my sins, Father. I will do my homework like a good schoolboy and believe you without question henceforth. And the next time I bring up the mind/brain transmission theory, I will do it after having heard about it, since it apparently debunks all of my argument.

It seems you are advocating interactive dualism here but where the brain produces consciousness. In other words although consciousness and therefore mental causality are brought into being by physical events in the brain, consciousness is an emergent phenomenon which has genuine causal powers.

If that's what you're saying I agree that this is intelligible (although I don't necessarily agree with it).

I'm going to regret resurrecting this thread, but I was watching The Matrix Reloaded (again; I do this every few months by instinct), and remembered.

Here's the relevant dialogue...It's an interesting--and different--frame to look at it.

I need to get those DVDs. I remember, when the first one came out, we went out for pizza with some good friends beforehand and were having this discussion about the nature of reality. (None of us had any idea what the movie was about.) I had been playing around with this idea that we were all in some sort of virtual reality. Then I watched the movie, and my eyes about bugged out of my head.

Here's the part that struck me in regards to this discussion:
I really do need to get those DVDs...

program...
 

people have been programmed by life in society.
so in that instant they are predictable.
free will is when you understand that you are judge jury and executioner of your actions.
impulsive people have this feeling in them naturally and that`s good.

no one is responsible for you, only yourself.
might sound harsh but better to cope with it rather then using some lame excuse for their mistakes.

so yes people with no free will are those restricted by society, work, social status, etc...

you are master of yourself, a self sufficiet being, free will, free choice, that`s what makes humans so versatile.

The Matrix Trilogy is decidedly great in that it asks far, far more questions than it even begins to answer. Even as one question seems to be answered (such as by the excerpt I posted), countering viewpoints are immediately presented, in the form of Smith, the Merovingian, Morpheus, and the Architect in astonishingly rapid succession.

But now I'm completely off-topic. Again. :p

They really should have stopped at the first one. I find it incredible that anyone has anything positive to say about parts 2 and 3. Unmitigated rubbish.

Ah, well, I went and read stuff on this site: The MATRIX 101 - Understanding The Matrix Trilogy

And while certain parts of it were extremely bad, like the final fight between Neo and Smith, I'm still impressed by the incredibly deep and rich re-layering and interweaving of storylines. Quite frankly, the first movie is the one I watch the least frequently, because it's the most boring and, aside from the premise of the milieu, presents very little that's interesting. It presents practically no difficult questions: just that of nature of reality. It's an intro course; there's no meat.

As an example, here's one interesting essay series on The Matrix Trilogy that requires all three movies is The Matrix and The Mater on feminism.

A recent study on the spontaneous behaviour of flies provides for some interesting speculation about what that may mean for the human brains and the concept of free will.

And there's lots of chatter about it all over the place

In my opinion one is responsible for one's actions and, free will or not, I have no doubt society would be adversely affected if it were any other way.

That's odd. Why would they expect anything to act linearly? Of course there's a chaotic variance inherent in brain functions. That's a fundamental mandate in life. He noted the need for unpredictable escape patterns; in humans, this additionally manifests as the ability to be creative.

But I've asked people to discuss chaos theory in reference to free will before and no one seemed interested or no one knows anything. I don't know enough about fractals or the chaos mathematics in general to look at things from that perspective.

Still, as he says, it's not a question of science. The debate over free will is a philosophical one, and so necessarily begins in the definition, not in any kind of empirical knowledge. If I define "gravity" to refer to the likelihood of people to make connections with people who are dour and ill-humored, the theory of gravity would probably be disproven pretty damn quickly, since people tend to dislike dour people, and wouldn't make connections with them.

Free Will is an outdated concept which should be confined to the history books.
If you look it up on the Wikipedia there is a whole lot of stuff about the concepts and theory of it, and how it used to apply in religion and philosophy.
I would replace it with something like personal choice - you make your choice according to the spiritual level you are at.
For example, if you and your family were starving, and you suddenly found a small piece of food, your first instinct may be to eat it immediately. But if you listened to your conscience, or higher self, or whatever, you may take on the message that it would be better to give it to your children.Then, perhaps, an even higher part of you may say, 'Well, actually, you should eat it so you have the strength to find more food', and so on. On this ascending escalator of higher, better choices, you will eventually plop onto one choice on a certain step, because that is where you are spiritually, where you feel most at home and accepting of that particular level's message and teaching.

To be honest, much of type of debate that you have asked for in this thread is over my head. It's quite possible that it is necessarily so, but doesn't negate the fact that I'm not up for it. :o

I wonder about this, Michael. While I can plainly see why a scientific discussion would need some definition groundwork in order to prove or disprove something (such as gravity), wouldn't it be different for a philosophical debate? If only for the fact that in the latter, nothing is likely to be proved?