Whether we have free will has been debated by philosophers for millennia. The problem can essentially be summarized as this: how can any of our choices be made freely, when every future action is a product of previous causal circumstances? We have the universal subjective experience of being able to make decisions, however our understanding of natural laws contradicts this perceived agency. Natural laws, studied by the sciences, tell us that everything physical in the universe has a deterministic cause and effect relationship. This should apply to our actions as well, therefore our subjective experience of having free will is merely an illusion. If determinism is true, where we do not have free will and everything is determinately caused, then other problems appear, like what should we think of moral responsibility, and do any of our choices even matter? In this paper, I will attempt to reconcile these issues of free will and determinism, while still maintaining that we do not have any free will. Free will is a necessary illusion that emerges from our need to navigate the world.
Before presenting my case, we should unpack why people believe that humans have free will. To begin with, everyone has a strong subjective experience of being able to make their own choices. We might not be in direct control over the circumstances that our choices exist in, but we do have the ability to weigh the various factors presented to us, and make a seemingly free decision about them. Having this free ability to adapt to the world through our choices imbues our lives with meaning and helps us make sense of life. It seems that free will must be true because of the utility it has for navigating life. Without free will, none of our decisions would seem to have any consequence, and therefore life would be empty of meaning. Our strong subjective experience and the ultimate utility for free will lead us to believe in it.
Laura Ekstrom makes a strong case for libertarianism (that we have free will). In her essay Indeterminist Free Action, Ekstrom argues that although mental states and other events may precede outcomes, acting as causal stimuli, the process of cause and effect need not be deterministic. Instead, she argues for indeterministic causation, where “in the case of free action, the considerations cause without determining the deliberative outcome” (Ekstrom, 2001, p. 145). This means that circumstances create the conditions for deliberation, but don’t guarantee any outcome from the process. Our preferences inform the decision making process, which is the immediate cause for an outcome. Therefore, our free will comes from our power to make decisions, predicated on the assumption that our preferences and identity are not coerced or determined by anything else. Our personal agency is still responsible for the decisions made, thus we have free will. Her account of free will also has three merits which she points out: (1) the case accounts for our desires for freedom - wanting an open future and for our decisions to be rationally explicable, (2) that it is phenomenologically accurate to our feeling of making decisions, and (3) that her account is naturalistically acceptable, without any need for weird metaphysics (Ekstrom, 2001, p. 149).
Although I do not agree with the assumption that our preferences and identity are not coerced by anything else, which her case for free will rests on, her three merits of free will encompass why the concept is so important. Free will gives us the felt ability to adapt to our circumstances. It allows us to ascribe responsibility for our actions, and hold people accountable for wrongdoings. It seems that we need free will in order to navigate the world effectively, and our deepest intuitions and subjective experience support this claim.
Belief in free will, however, does not hold up to scientific, logical, or even subjective scrutiny. The weight of evidence for determinism continues to grow through scientific inquiry, making its case against free will very strong. Neuroscience is continually showing that our minds are products of physical circumstances. If we believe the simple and empirically sound argument that our mental states are products of physical states, like neuron patterns firing in our frontal cortex, as physicalists suggest, then our perceived free choices are products of physical causes. These physical causes are themselves caused by other natural physical causes, such as a person's environment or genetics. In adopting a physicalist perspective, which we should since it is backed up by testable and measurable factors, there is very little room for our preferences or identity to be completely independent as Ekstrom suggests, which is what allows for free will. Therefore, determinism is correct based on empirically sound science that supports physicalism.
Further evidence for determinism can be found in the logical sequence of events within which free will supposedly exists. Every current condition, including mental states, are caused by previous ones. This pattern of logical regression to find the ultimate causation can go on ad infinitum. Galen Strawson, a contemporary philosopher explains this best: “in order for one to be ultimately responsible [for one's actions], one would have to be causa sui — the ultimate cause or origin of oneself, or at least of some crucial part of one’s mental nature.” (Strawson, 1998) Strawson is saying that for us to have genuine free will, our actions, including our preferences and identity which are involved with the decision making process, must come from some original source that we can say is independent of previous causal effects. On examination, we can’t say that any of our preferences or mental characteristics have an ultimate origin of our own making. They are always informed by other causal situations not in our control, like our environment and genetics, therefore Strawson’s assessment is logically correct. Following the logical sequences of our decision making processes finds that our decisions are deterministic.
Even if causal stimuli are indeterministic or random, we still do not have free will. As Strawson also points out, there is no way that we can be ultimately responsible for actions that either are indeterminate or random (Strawson, 1998). By definition, indeterminate actions or random actions cannot be caused by a particular preference or set of characteristics. It is a logical contradiction. Either our preferences and personal characteristics have a pattern of cause and effect leading to our decisions, where we cannot find the true origin of our individual agency, or they are indeterminate and random, therefore up to chance and not caused by ourselves. In both cases, through logical scrutiny, Strawson’s argument against free will is correct. We don’t have any free will.
However, Strawson’s case does not address the key argument for why we feel that we have free will; our strong subjective testimony of making our own decisions. I argue that even this subjective experience cannot stand up to introspective scrutiny. Upon inspection of our thoughts, feelings, and decision making processes over which we claim responsibility, we cannot find that we are ultimately responsible for authoring these features in our consciousness. They simply manifest in our field of awareness.
To illustrate this phenomenon of not being the authors of our decision making process, consider the following instructions. Recall three books that you have read. Why did those three books come to mind? Is there any sense that you had control over which three books, out of all the others you have read, came to mind? Or are you assuming these titles manifested by your own choice? Maybe you are not in charge of what appears in consciousness, but surely you are responsible for a deliberate choice. Now, out of these three titles, pick one. Take a second if you would like to consider which one to pick. Why did you pick one over the other two? Is this process truly authored by you, or are you identifying with the decision making process that is merely appearing in consciousness? Upon inspection of our subjective experience of decision making, we can find that the process is appearing in consciousness, and our identification with the process creates the illusion of free will.
Free will is an illusion we identify with that comes from our need as humans to navigate the world through decision making. Our consciousness allows for us to be aware and adapt to the world in real time. In order for consciousness to adapt to the world, however, decisions must be made about how to act and react in it. These decisions, informed by cause and effect relationships in the natural world, are interpreted as free will by our identification with the process. However, identifying with the decision making processes does not mean that we have any control over it.
A classic objection to determinism is the problem of moral responsibility. If everything is determined about someone's actions, how can we ascribe any merit or punishment to them. They would ultimately not be responsible for anything that they do, therefore we cannot reasonably hold anyone accountable for their decisions and actions. The significance of our actions seems to be totally diminished by adopting a deterministic view of human behaviour.
This objection, however, is taking the illusion of free will to be synonymous with the importance of our decisions. Our decisions, though they are not authored by us, are still worthy of merit or punishment. The decisions and their outcomes still affect the world, and must be reacted to in turn to either encourage or discourage future causal conditions. A murderer's decision making processes must be reacted to so we can prevent future murders or discourage others from murdering by punishing him, though on a personal level he is not responsible for his actions. Awareness of the decision making process being an illusion does not diminish the importance of making decisions.
An immediate objection to this reply may be that this is not fair to the murderer, on a personal level, because his person had no choice over his actions. Punishment of him personally is not fair, even if there is utility and importance in reacting to his determined decisions and actions. How can we justifiably ascribe merit or punishment to a human being if they had no control over their actions, even if there is ultimate utility for it?
In response, I argue that our acknowledgment of free will as a necessary illusion allows us to more accurately engage in discussions of merit and punishment. By recognizing the illusion of our own free will and the free will of others, we can hold each other in a more compassionate and understanding light. Instead of ascribing ultimate responsibility for a murderer's actions, we can seek to compassionately understand why they did such a thing, while still acknowledging the importance of reacting to their actions. This acknowledgement of free will as an illusion allows us to be more compassionate towards our human condition, while still acknowledging the need for decision making.
Understanding free will as a necessary illusion to navigate the world can still fulfill the three merits of Ekstroms account of free will. (1) Our futures are still open ended, it is not fatalistic or hard determinism, there can still be some randomness as Heisenberg's principle of uncertainty in physics suggests. Our decisions can still be rationally explicable, even though the feeling of freedom is an illusion. (2) Free will as an illusion still is phenomenologically accurate to our feeling of making decisions. What's more, we cannot escape the feeling no matter how much we try since the illusion is a byproduct of consciousness having to make choices to navigate the world. It’s impossible to decide to not make a choice, because that in itself is one. (3) The account is naturalistically strong on all levels of empirical, logical, and subjective scrutiny. The illusion of free will is still of vital importance for us to navigate the world, and by acknowledging determinism we can have more compassion and understanding for our human condition.
References
Ekstrom, L. W. (2001). Indeterminist Free Action. In Agency and Responsibility: Essays on the Metaphysics of Freedom (pp. 138–157). essay, Westview Press.
Strawson, G. (1998, June 26). Luck Swallows Everything. London; Times Literary Supplement.
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