I was born at a particular time and place, to a certain set of parents, with a specific set of family histories genetically and socially, in a peculiar cultural milieu, all of which influence my thinking.
Besides this, every moment of my life, from birth to now, has taught me something, great or small: like every other normal human, I am a learning engine.
The person I call "I" consists in a set of life experiences so unique to myself that not even an identical twin's lessons learned could possibly duplicate mine, and therefore neither would his thoughts, actions or decisions be the same. The fact that I am a profoundly unique bundle of physical and mental influences is a premise I accept completely.
But the question whether I have "free will" is inconsequential. I need not consider whether I am free while I make any particular decision for myself. It doesn't matter whether that decision involves life, death, duties, allegiances, or just breakfast. I don't ask myself if I am free beforehand. It isn't necessary. I think, I act, I judge.
I am what I am — whatever that is — so uniquely and independently from what anyone else is, and so complex in the details of personal experience, that no science can fathom my decisions: it cannot say, precisely, what "causes" them. To hold the uniqueness of my being up to the notion of cause and effect is to ponder the effects of a complexity so profound that no science can trace them back reliably to their causes.
The fact remains that all relevant influences on my thinking, genetic or environmental, belong to me only. They are not matched exactly in anyone else, and completely constitute my "self."
Therefore to say "I" am not the cause of my own actions, thoughts or decisions is futile, because I am the actions, thoughts and decisions. I am everything I have thought or done — and especially, learned — from birth to now. Even if I am a product of everything in my past, such that I can decide no other way, still my decisions are mine alone. I own them. I am identical with them.
My past influences cannot be undone, but neither do they obligate or limit me to act or decide any way other than my capacity for reason brings me to. Moreover, no matter what the relevant chain of causation might be, how I arrive at any decision — including caprice, since I am not a machine — is nobody else's business anyhow.
Let philosophers speculate on "the will." Let scientists study brain and mind. They cannot reliably predict my next decision or action in the absence of coercion. To do so would require a knowledge of my personal influences in all their complexity at a level of detail that is impossible to map. The exercise would be futile and, indeed, absurd.
So when Sam Harris and similar thinkers doubt "free will" (itself a suspect term because "the will" is an abstraction, not a module of the brain), and opine that every act of "willing" is reducible to some chain of cause and effect, they are trafficking in absurdity.
The question is moot. Logic and reason are the same everywhere and anyone can use them. Whenever I use them, I am free. That is: as long as I think, I am free.
Dr. Harris might be right about cause and effect in the abstract — if he first supposes everything happens for a reason. But he also assumes that visceral processes rather than logic always rule the day — ie, that all decisions are entirely visceral, and thus beyond modification by reason. Even if that were true (it is not), it's extremely unlikely that any science can demonstrate the full relevant chain of visceral causation in even one non-coerced decision by any actual breathing normal human being.
Harris and company cannot respond in any practical, reliable, scientific way to the simple challenge: "Show the cause."
That demonstration is even less likely if logic and reason can override the visceral. Scientists must admit as a corollary to their method that dispassionate reason is possible. Otherwise they abandon the possibility of objective science.
Is "free will" an illusion? No, "the will" is a myth to begin with, and discussing its freedom is like asking the color of unicorns. Arguments against free will are strawman attacks. Read closely, the arguments actually intend to cast doubt on "the self" as an independent moral agent. All the better to mechanize you, my dear.
Is the self an illusion, then? Not as long as I'm talking about me.
The fact remains that all relevant influences on my thinking, genetic or environmental, belong to me only. They are not matched exactly in anyone else, and completely constitute my "self."
Therefore to say "I" am not the cause of my own actions, thoughts or decisions is futile, because I am the actions, thoughts and decisions. I am everything I have thought or done — and especially, learned — from birth to now. Even if I am a product of everything in my past, such that I can decide no other way, still my decisions are mine alone. I own them. I am identical with them.
My past influences cannot be undone, but neither do they obligate or limit me to act or decide any way other than my capacity for reason brings me to. Moreover, no matter what the relevant chain of causation might be, how I arrive at any decision — including caprice, since I am not a machine — is nobody else's business anyhow.
Let philosophers speculate on "the will." Let scientists study brain and mind. They cannot reliably predict my next decision or action in the absence of coercion. To do so would require a knowledge of my personal influences in all their complexity at a level of detail that is impossible to map. The exercise would be futile and, indeed, absurd.
So when Sam Harris and similar thinkers doubt "free will" (itself a suspect term because "the will" is an abstraction, not a module of the brain), and opine that every act of "willing" is reducible to some chain of cause and effect, they are trafficking in absurdity.
The question is moot. Logic and reason are the same everywhere and anyone can use them. Whenever I use them, I am free. That is: as long as I think, I am free.
Dr. Harris might be right about cause and effect in the abstract — if he first supposes everything happens for a reason. But he also assumes that visceral processes rather than logic always rule the day — ie, that all decisions are entirely visceral, and thus beyond modification by reason. Even if that were true (it is not), it's extremely unlikely that any science can demonstrate the full relevant chain of visceral causation in even one non-coerced decision by any actual breathing normal human being.
Harris and company cannot respond in any practical, reliable, scientific way to the simple challenge: "Show the cause."
That demonstration is even less likely if logic and reason can override the visceral. Scientists must admit as a corollary to their method that dispassionate reason is possible. Otherwise they abandon the possibility of objective science.
Is "free will" an illusion? No, "the will" is a myth to begin with, and discussing its freedom is like asking the color of unicorns. Arguments against free will are strawman attacks. Read closely, the arguments actually intend to cast doubt on "the self" as an independent moral agent. All the better to mechanize you, my dear.
Is the self an illusion, then? Not as long as I'm talking about me.
4 comments:
- Lo said...
- Oh, my. My head is spinning. You force me to think too much, my dear GC. Worse yet.....after digesting your fascinating treatise I had to go look up Sam Harris, not having a clue about who in the sam hill he is. Whew. Now I know sort of who he is but I am still trying to digest some hunks of stuff he wrote. I think I need some Tums.
- GTChristie said...
- I dont think he's worth the heartburn but ... see what happens when I get serious? What I'm saying here, to a professional philosopher, is out and out rebellious.
- Mark English said...
- Yes, a bit of passion here, a bit of defiance. A couple of thoughts. You're right about the uniqueness and the inability to predict. But you'd have to say the same about a dog, wouldn't you? Which takes a bit of the gloss off it. Rather than thought or thinking per se I would emphasize language (which Rover doesn't have). A language-using brain operates differently from a non-language-using brain. Whatever freedom we have over and above other animals is I suspect in large part due to this factor.
- GTChristie said...
- I do find dogs unpredictable. And you have rightly tagged linguistic thought as the primary difference between other animals and people. Although I didn't elaborate it here, my view of freedom is directly linked to thinking -- patently conscious thought -- after and beyond any emotional or intuitive inputs. So your comment amplifies my case. But you have taught me that I should always clarify that the "thinking" I refer to is linguistic. [edited 2014]
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