Michael S. Gazzaniga
Image: University of California, Santa Barbara
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The Wisdom of Psychopaths
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Do we have free will? It is an age-old question which has attracted the attention of philosophers, theologians, lawyers and political theorists. Now it is attracting the attention of neuroscience, explains Michael S. Gazzaniga, director of the SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and author of the new book, “Who’s In Charge: Free Will and the Science of the Brain.” He spoke with Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook.
Cook: Why did you decide to tackle the question of free will?
Gazzaniga: I think the issue is on every thinking person’s mind. I can remember wondering about it 50 years ago when I was a student at Dartmouth. At that time, the issue was raw and simply stated. Physics and chemistry were king and while all of us were too young to shave, we saw the implications. For me, those were back in the days when I went to Church every Sunday, and sometimes on Monday if I had an exam coming up!
Now, after 50 years of studying the brain, listening to philosophers, and most recently being slowly educated about the law, the issue is back on my front burner. The question of whether we are responsible for our actions -- or robots that respond automatically -- has been around a long time but until recently the great scholars who spoke out on the issue didn’t know modern science with its deep knowledge and implications.
Cook: What makes you think that neuroscience can shed any light on what has long been a philosophical question?
Gazzaniga: Philosophers are the best at articulating the nature of a problem before anybody knows anything empirical. The modern philosophers of mind now seize on neuroscience and cognitive science to help illuminate age old questions and to this day are frequently ahead of the pack. Among other skills, they have time to think! The laboratory scientist is consumed with experimental details, analyzing data, and frequently does not have the time to place a scientific finding into a larger landscape. It is a constant tension.
Having said that, philosophers can’t have all the fun. Faced with the nature of biologic mechanisms morning, noon, and night, neuroscientists can’t help but think about such questions as the nature of “freedom of action in a mechanistic universe” as one great neuroscientist put it years ago. At a minimum, neuroscience directs one’s attention to the question of how does action come about.
Cook: Do you think that neuroscience, as a field, needs to tackle these questions? That is, do you consider free will an important scientific question?
Gazzaniga: We all need to understand more about free will, or more wisely put, the nature of action. Neuroscience is one highly relevant discipline to this issue. Whatever your beliefs about free will, everyone feels like they have it, even those who dispute that it exists. What neuroscience has been showing us, however, is that it all works differently than how we feel it must work. For instance, neuroscientific experiments indicate that human decisions for action are made before the individual is consciously aware of them. Instead of this finding answering the age-old question of whether the brain decides before the mind decides, it makes us wonder if that is even the way to think about how the brain works. Research is focused on many aspects of decision making and actions, such as where in the brain decisions to act are formed and executed, how a bunch of interacting neurons becomes a moral agent, and even how one’s beliefs about whether they have free will affect their actions. The list of issues where neuroscience will weigh in is endless.
Cook: Please explain what you mean by the idea of an "emergent mind," and the distinction you draw between this and the brain?
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93 Comments
Add CommentWhich philosophers is this guy talking about? Who said anything about free will requiring us to be "free from the laws of nature," or that "there is some little guy in their head calling the shots," or that we are not "a special kind of machine"? If none of the legitimate proponents of the existence of free will disagree with what neuroscience says is how the brain works, then who's philosophy is Gazzaniga criticizing, and what are his arguments against the actual (read: non-straw men) philosopher's conception of free will?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe concept of "free will" doesn't even make sense, even from a philosophical perspective. It was always a religious concept, embraced by Christianity as a way to explain away the obvious flaws with reality while placing none of the blame on a "perfect god". Within the Christian framework it is impossible for a perfect god to exist and to have created a perfect world if the world that we live in today is clearly imperfect, so "free will" was the scapegoat, to which all flaws in the world can be attributed. It served a similar role in Plato's philosophy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut at any rate, everything can only be either deterministic or random, that's it. If something isn't deterministic then it is random. Perhaps a system can operate with a mix of deterministic and random elements, but the random elements are still random.
If any entity's actions are deterministic then we say they are not truly "free". However, if any individual's actions are not deterministic then they are random, in which case they are not a product of "will", nor, I would suggest, are they any more "free" than deterministic actions.
This argument applies even if we move into the realm of souls, etc. the last bastion of "free willers". Even if you claim that the material world is deterministic, but a "human soul" makes decisions outside of the material world and "operates the mind" or something, the soul would still have to operate within the sphere of logic, its actions too would be either deterministic or random, what else could they be? The notion that lays of determinism yield a final product that is non-deterministic is just "ghost in the machine" lazy nonsense.
"Free will" is simply an illusion, created by the conscious observation of unconsciously determined actions. Because our consciousnesses is unaware of the origins of our actions, it perceives them as without having any origin at all, as arising spontaneously and "freely", as if by magic. It's just a trick due to our inability to determine the causes of our own actions.
"The concept of "free will" doesn't even make sense, even from a philosophical perspective. It was always a religious concept." Then why are non-religious philosophers the ones defending it?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"If any entity's actions are deterministic then we say they are not truly 'free'" Who is "we"? Certainly not contemporary philosophers who support the idea of free will. Have you read any of the contemporary arguments in favor of free will?
"This argument applies even if we move into the realm of souls, etc. the last bastion of "free willers"." Who are you talking about? The legitimate proponents of free will are naturalists...they do not propose that there is a realm of souls or anything of the sort. They consider free will to be a product of evolutionary biology. It is bound by determinism just like everything else. It is, just like you say, a bunch of tricks.
Saying something like 'determinism is true therefore there is no free will' is exactly what is contentious. Philosophers aren't trying to convince anyone that determinism is false, or that there are strange magical things responsible for consciousness or free will.
I try to practice radical acts of randomness and I am always suprised at the practical magic that I notice along the way. Which came first, I don't know. I just choose to observe the outcome with an open mind,brain,soul. B.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder if any of the people who claim free will does not exists would be okay w/ the criminal walking away unpunished when they are victim of a big crime. (^_^)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAmazing that he could write an article about this subject, and NOT mention Ben Libet. "Free will" has been proven to be a fallacy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ4nwTTmcgs
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy on earth would criminals go unpunished? The notion that the entire criminal justice system would fall apart if free will in the historical philosophical/theological sense to accepted not to exist is nonsense.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe prospect of punishment is itself one of the inputs into the machine that determines actions.
There is no spoon... lol. Seriously though, the concept of free will itself is quite often ill defined. It is also an entirely separate issue from moral/social responsibility. We have to ask questions like free will: free from what? Free from genetic determinism? And if ones genetic predispositions, for example, define who we are, our identity; then would we be essentially free from ourselves? Then it seems that we would not even be our 'self' who is acting independently from the 'us' who is defined by the predisposition. Even if we are not determined, like though some quantum mechanical magic, that does not mean we are freely choosing anything. Throwing dice does not mean you are free. The free will concept seems to lack a logical foundation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne has to coonsider the possibility of a bicameral mind as proposed by Julian Jaynes. Consider that each half of the brain competes for control of the body. The degree by which one half gains control of the deterministic behaviour of the other half might be considered an act of freeing the body from the control of determinism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn this respect one might consider that there is a battle of 'Free Won't' in guiding the behaviour of the body by stoppping certain specific actions. Thus the remaining actions of the body might be freed from its otherwise animal behaviour. This is shown in Libet's experiments.
To be neurologically correct, we need to replace the duality of "free will" vs. "determinism" with a graduated concept in which the choices of different individuals regarding different things are subject to different degrees of neurological compulsion, otherwise defined as the degree to which the neurological circuitry involved in making the choice forces a certain outcome. Thus, at one end of the spectrum a hard-core addict cannot be thought of as having free will when it comes to choosing whether to use the substance to which she is addicted; on the other end of the spectrum there is complete free will when it comes to picking between the blouse with the red polka dots versus the blouse with the orange polka dots.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"For instance, neuroscientific experiments indicate that human decisions for action are made before the individual is consciously aware of them."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell, this is not strictly true. These experiments demonstrate that neurophysiological markers of human decisions occur prior to conscious awareness; however, we are in no way capable of knowing whether it is these neurophysiological events, or the subsequent activation of consciousness (putatively, also underlaid by additional neurophysiological events) which constitute a "decision". Hence, these neurophysiological events which occur prior to conscious perception might be necessary for decision-making, while still being insufficient.
Nonetheless, I am glad that Gazzinaiga uses the next sentence to ask whether this is thinking about the mind and brain in the wrong way--which I think clearly it is. To try and talk about consciousness and neurophysiological events as though they are separate entities implicitly suggests a dualist model of the mind, while much of what we believe to be true about the brain implies that monism is in play. Hence, the idea that there could be neurophysiological events which correspond to a conscious decision prior to that decision being made, does not make sense. Under this model, the conscious decision and the neurophysiological events must be assumed to occur concurrently in time.
"Free from what? What does anybody want to be free from?"
This is a phrase which I agree with whole-heartedly. The problem with the term "free will" is that it implies that we must be free from something. But what is this thing? Unless we assume a dualist model of mind and brain, and attempt to incorporate a "spiritual" construct into the human condition, this question of freedom becomes meaningless.
@bigbopper and @zstansfi
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAgreed.
I find the way Gazzaniga attaches, and distinguishes between, the words mind and brain is a brake on further understanding of the issues
Free will is simply an effective tool...to punish people for rule breaking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe hold people responsible for breaking common ideas that keep us all safe. It's just one of the many tools we all use. If you think about it, there's others.
The problem is why some people choose to be "Mavericks."
Reality is not fun? Life is boring? No common sense? Whatever?
Thinking different is good, when it's positive.
People who like to be a little-bit-bad, get there.
Maybe, too much free time on their hands.
We are one person. What our brain thinks, we are.
The brain should think ahead before I do anything, that's it's job.
I feel that I make all choices based on what I have learned and if it was worth doing again, was is right, the out-come ok, whatever the noun is...
Like getting burned or hitting self with hammer, if it was not rewarding. Once was enough.
People are very aware of what they are doing and what they want.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat's another "people tool" to protect our option to do what we want when most others are against it.
These are honest excuses, used in a off-handed way, to get what we want. I'm sure we have all heard and used them too!
Free will is not a pre-requisite for the enforcement of reward and punishment. There is no reason why we should not do away with the flawed concept entirely, and reconstitute our legal system to encourage socially constructive behaviour without utilizing a system of retributive punishment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat do you mean –at random- ? Do you mean that there are miracles which are making things coming out at random?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf A affects B without being right next to it, then the effect in question must be indirect – that is must be something that gets transmitted by means of a chain of events. But in all cases are the events which make other events coming out, even if for us human beings it will be impossible to know why, because the Heisenberg uncertainty principle states a fundamental limit on the accuracy with which certain pairs of physical properties of a particle can be simultaneously known. But it doesn't mean that, only because we don't know, there are things at random, evidently then produced by miracles!
Aside from your arguments, which certainly seem valid to me, whatever the will is, it will cause us to act in accordance with what it ultimately is, and we can't decide what that is before getting it. My unchosen will must always be what determines my actions, randomly or deterministically--a little man who hops into my brain and runs it--because of what it is, not because of what I am.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf the brain were so simple we could understand it, we would be so simple we couldn't. - by Watson, Lyall.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBasically, you are all wrong, including the article. ;)
dantevialetto, I think the miracles you are referring to are quantum events, which are apparently truly random.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI used to believe that everything was either determined or random, and that the important thing was to act as if we have free will. Then people pointed out all the things that cannot be explained by a mechanistic universe, such as consciousness and qualia. Until those are explained, then the idea of "free will" in a truly non-deterministic and non-random sense cannot be ruled out. Of course having a spiritual "soul" inside the physical body, like the hand inside a puppet, can explain both consciousness and qualia. That would push the problem into the spiritual world where the "soul" lives (and perhaps into worlds beyond that one). In that case we in this world do not have the tools to investigate them. It would be like running a character in a real-time simulation game trying to determine what it is like to have the consciousness and experiences of the person playing him/her. Those experiences are not "in" the simulation at all, but in the person pretending to be in the simulation world.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a psychologist I see free will in fairly pragmatic terms - can someone decide they want to do something, such as lose weight, implement an exercise regime, stop drinking, and actually do it. You can place 100 people with the same intention, within the same environmental contingencies, and yet only 30% or so will achieve their goal. That ability appears to be a trait, in that the same 100 people given another challenge/ goal, will have most of those initial "successful" people, also achieve the new goal. I would suggest that those people have free will and are operating outside of chance or deterministic influences.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe meditative traditions recognize individual differences in "mindfulness" and "Presence" and how "conscious" someone is, and that someone high on these traits have more capacity to exercise their free will and determine the outcome of their life. They also believe these traits can be developed with specific meditation practices.
Certainly my experience as a clinician is that my clients develop more free will as they recover from their conditions. Thus a person who had been suffering from depression is able to get out of bed and engage in life more fully, as they had been wanting to do for years. The person with OCD can leave home without engaging in the obsessive stereotypical behaviours they have had to for years. These examples are more extreme than the original ones I mentioned above, but illustrate the same point more clearly.
My 2 cents of free will's worth.
Baruch Spinoza postulated in the 17th century that there was neither free will nor god. Deus sive natura (god which is to say nature) was his link with the religions of the world. I am surprised that no one has mentionned Spinoza so far. He also postulated that man`s brain understood that :one, it had to survived (conatus), and two that violence was reversible, therefore better avoided. From this evidence :the rule of laws is slowly replacing the insecurity of violence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThank you. You have saved me from having to say the exact same thing. :o)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUmmm...you keep saying philosophers think there is free will..but you don't say which philosophers or what their argument is. I think the only question that matters in discussing free will is: "Can the agent choose other than as s/he did choose?" At that point you get back to determinism. If there is determinism than the choice was not 'free', and if there is not deteriminism, than the act is random, and therefore not free. Do you have another way of defining free will? If so, please let us know what it is so we can have a conversation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow, exactly, do you 'practice' randomness? Sounds like an oxymoron to me.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt would seem that the validity of 'Free Will' is wholly dependent on the context presented, and whether the discussion is a focused effort.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article seems to a free wheeling diatribe of opinion on Free Will...
Well-thought out problem solving with proven, sustantive outcome negates hocus-pocus magical thinking which depends on a toss of the 'fuzzy dice'... And as everyone knows,'fuzzy dice' generally land on their fuzzy edge generating murkey thinking with no real solution or conclusion....
I do not believe in free will, but I would never suggest 'criminals' 'get away' with whatever they do. The question is: how do we react to people working outside our established boundaries of allowable behaviors. I don't think we should 'punish' people who break our laws, but I do think we need to protect the population from those acts, and if quarantine or ostracism are the best ways to do that...well that is what should be done. To demonize the behavior, however, is pointless.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOh, and, I have been the 'victim' of a few crimes, and I still do not believe the perpetrator should be 'punished'. If you are a religious person I say to you: "Vengeance is mine, sayeth the lord". If you are not a religious person than I say to you, "vengeance is counter-productive." Either way vengeance makes no sense.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI prefer to think of 'consequences' rather than 'punishments'. But aside from that, you are , of course, correct.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIndeed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFree will is not the same as choice. We, of course, make choices. The question is: Can we choose other than as we do.? I would argue no..and if you then say, well I can choose the other blouse, I will say, of course, but in the end the choice you make is the choice you make, and it is determined by all of your genetics and all of your experiences, (nature and nurture) coming together such that at this moment in time you make the choice you make. If it is not 'determined' by that it is random, not free.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExactly...the agent makes the choice, but the agent does not make the agent.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOK, then tell us what is correct...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease let me know what the alternative is to: either deterministic or random'. I don't know any other way of defining actions.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou say we work "outside of chance or deterministic influences." What pray tell, is the third option?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFree will is based on a literally Newtonian handicapped view of determinism vs random, wrapped in a finite box. No such thing exists, neither in the smallest known quanta, nor the visible universe. There is no logic in the mechanics of mind, only algebras of infinities. There is no need for spirits ... as emergence (from infinite complexity layered on infinite physical indeterminism wrapped in infinitely unknown forces, dimensions and ... perhaps ... super 'natural' interactions of emergent minds) ... is by definition not a determistic process - since it is impossible to determine state. Sure, you can model the brain, neuron by neuron, connection by connection ... and get a fair simulation, but that's not emergence. Until someone can put my mind in a box, separate the parts and model my thoughts exactly - I remain free and non-deterministic. Except from, maybe, God.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKaren00100 said "Please let me know what the alternative is to: either deterministic or random'. I don't know any other way of defining actions."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf there is a soul, then we may have whatever free will the soul has. Assuming the soul operates outside of the laws of the universe, we cannot say whether what kinds of physical laws govern its action. So we can't say whether it is determined by those laws, by random events like quantum events, or by something entirely different that we cannot imagine.
The existence of consciousness and qualia show that "something" (maybe like a "soul") exists outside the laws of nature, and therefore why not free will too? The fact that we can recognize qualia and talk about them using this physical body and this brain indicates that there is some way in which the "soul" (or whatever experiences the qualia) is able to affect the brain and its perceptions.
Did I answer your question?
I think that is where the construct of free will comes in. I don't believe your position that its 'either determined or chance' is completely accurate. My understanding is that chaos theory emerged when scientists realized that outcomes of complex systems can NOT be predicted, even with all the data points monitored and accounted for. Minor changes in initial conditions can lead to major and unpredictable changes in outcomes, ala the butterfly affect. And yet its not chance, its chaotic. So perhaps there are three options for free will - random, determined or chaotic, and chaotic works because it is neither random nor determined and yet still has its "strange attractors" - general outcome patterns that tend to "want to" occur over and over from different starting points. Thus if our free will is chaotic, I could "want to" lose weight, and depending on the factors in my chaotic system, I achieve that (say) daily goal more or less frequently then someone who has a different chaotic system, so that I eventually do or do not lose weight. Whether I do or not is not random and its not determined, yet there's some sort of tendency and individual differences there, which sounds a lot like free will. Of course even my "wanting to" lose weight would be the result of such chaotic processes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's really not interesting to read the remarks of people who deny the possibility of free will. Since they have proclaimed that they have arrived at this "truth" by a determinist, and necessarily chance (from our perspective), sequence of
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissteps they have simply kicked away the block on which they hoped to stand. Their claim is not wrong because only a proposition that is meaningful can be right or wrong.Their proposition means nothing at all.
Karen,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe fact is that humans are able to think. They are able to consider alternatives and make decisions. Often this is done in the unconscious mind, but the fact is that the conscious mind often primes the unconscious som it is able to make good and quick decisions.
Athletes practice so they can make good, quick decisions during games. Musicians practice also. Students study to prepare for tests. Professionals prepare themselves for difficult situations. These are conscious actions and decisions made to improve our behavior and decision making which then appears to be instinctive.
The fact is, if humans were not able able to learn from their mistakes, then one could say that our behavior is predetermined. In other words if the same external stimulus always results in the same mental response, then it would seem that our behavior is predetermined. That is not true, although some people are better able to learn from experience than others.
Our behavior is not random, but it does change. It is not predetermined by our experiences or by our mental structure, but it is determined by how we are able relate our ideas to our human and physical environment.
Our behavior is neither random or determined, but adaptive (or sometimes maladaptive.) Our freedom is determined by our ability to creatively and positively adapt to our surroundings, both human and natural.
Yes we humans have uploaded our critical needs to the social system around us. But we also download from the society by way of Pavlovian and operant conditioning and model learning and, with practice/trials, we form Gestalt fields inside our brains. Mind is an ever changing gestalt.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy bias as a hard-core materialist is that there's just a bunch of interconnected neurons, and the choices we make represent their output. There's no "free will" on top of this. "Free will" is a philosophical concept which is useful in the justice system to justify punishment of those who, as the argument goes, have freely chosen to do wrong when they could have done right. It has no neurological basis, and physically it just doesn't exist.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo Big,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat do you think society should do with those who break its rules by lying, stealing, and killing?
Or do you think that we need no rules and no society?
Maybe someone has mentioned this before -- I havent't read all 50 comments to the article -- but neuroscience still doesn't understand where consciousness comes from -- it's an emergent property. I.e., one neuron can't think, but an array of neurons can....
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs we have consciousness, this thing we can't relate to the firing of any particular neurons, then we have at least limited free will, within the constraints of cause-and-effect determinism. (Borrowing the argument of philosopher Patrick Grim.
The legal system recognizes this -- if you're forced to commit a crime, you're not penalized as if you decided yourself to commit a crime.
If Prof Gazzaniga is trying to say that free will vs determinism is a false dichotomy, that's true. But if his intent is to rule out any kind of free will, then the evidence is against him.
Eric,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI expect I agree with you.
As for Prof. G. I am not exactly sure fraom where he is coming from. In this interview it sounds like he agrees with B B. Elsewhere it seems that he is more inclined to say that free will vs determinism is a false dichotomy. He does seem mto affirm that humans can think which BB does not.
My view is that we are caught up in Western dualism, even those who do not agree with it. This means that we Western folk think in terms of either/or opposites such as: free or determined, right or wrong, true or false, black or white. This is known as the fallacy of The Missing Middle. Just because one can define something which is not red as green does not make all hues that are not red are green. See my comment above.
Materialists like BB have a problem because thinking is not material or physical. If all that is not matter or energy does not exist, then thinking and ideas do not exist. Communication does not exist. Life based on meaning and values does not exist. That is manifestly not true.
I have free will and i literally dont know what to do...i wish my brain thought for me
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy do we have to choose between determinism and randomness? Stochastic probability implies order, albeit within the real-time possibilities of the certainty that is implied in having arrived at that noumenal invariant truth. But, being consciously aware of our human species perceptual and conceptual limitations, we have to settle for a hybrid model (e.g., BPS) incorporating the sensory physical and the relevant but invisible/metaphysical. If Gazzaniga et al are happy being deterministic robots like other subhuman species are,incapable of the introspective faculty of being simultaneously an actor and an observer, then explain the programmer. If you accept as true the order at either micro or micro level of organization, then you must know that self-deterministic systems follow entropy laws. If you also consider that often people make decisions contra natura or self interest (genetically determined. I have not read all comments yet. I discussed these issues in my blog: http://angelldls.wordpress.com/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with your definition of free will. It's strange that Gazzaniga is proposing to abandon the concept of free will without clearly defining what he meant by free will. His idea of free will seems to be "a little guy in your head calling the shots." And his dichotomy between the brain and the mind is like the materialism vs. idealism in philosophy. For a scientist, his ideas seem metaphysical.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is not how scientists look at the problem. There is no dichotomy of brain vs. mind. The mind is the output of the brain. No brain, no mind. There is no little guy in your head. There is only a brain in your head and one of the many things it does is what we call "free will." Free will is better understood in the context of psychology - what particular human behavior is attributed to free will.
Nature and our biological endowments derived from nature provide us with certain, but constrained, affordances. To some degree we can go beyond these constraints in two ways: (1) by altering nature to create contrived affordances, such as tools, which extend our perception and control of ourselves and our environment, and (2) by our ability to imagine and verbalize possibilities that go beyond nature's affordances. To this extent, we have something that might be called free will.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy friends,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf one is a monist and believes that only the physical, that is matter and energy are real, then non-material aspects of reality do not exist.
Neurological scientists point to evidence that our brain controls our behavior, not our thoughts, and our brain is controled or determined by the material forces of nature. That is the science that Prof G is coming from. Indeed he did some of the research on which it is based.
The primary problem is that the brain is not a centralized system as humans had assumed, it is decentralized. From this discovery comes the assumption that humans cannot think and are not really self- conscious. Again they jump from a to z without considering any possible alternatives in between.
Greenmind and DougT: Your open minds truly reflect your ability to think freely.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFree Will is such an exact concept, that it can not possibly determined from inside an unbounded box. If you take a virtual box (ie computer), and constrain it to very specific rules, and set the actors in motion ... sure, that limits free will. As a Sr. Intel engineer - I can assure you, not even a transistor can be bound in a box ... not to mention billions of them in a fluid environment.
But I like to think, once any form of infinite indeterminism / unknown is introduced, then free-will exists ... so long as there is nothing that can predict an actors actions.
Once I was sitting in a debate between Alwyn Scott and Stuart Hammeroff. Alwyn believes in consciousness as solitons emergent from chaos. Hammeroff (and Penrose) believe in Orchestrated Objective Reality .. which is basically that our neurons have millions of nanotubes, which are on the order of quantum effects, able to setup quantum computing entanglements. I used to think the centriol at the center of these nanotubes acted as a tuning fork in the quantum state. Its possible. In any case, I asked the two, if it were not possible that they were both right. Alwyn and Stuart agreed that, yes, there may be a coupling of Orc-OR and Solitons in the emergence of mind. point being - these are a couple of the greatest minds / ideas - who lead the Tucson 'Toward a science of Consciousness' conferences. Both theories leave the door wide open for free will.
No, from a social point of view I don't see any alternative to retaining the current justice system and its attendant concept of free will. It already makes some allowances for "reduced free will", such as the concept of "diminished capacity" for second degree murder.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThinking IS physical. A thought is a certain arrangement and sequence of neurons and neuronal firing. Thus, it is a physical object.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisbigbopper wrote:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"A thought is a certain arrangement and sequence"
Arrangments and sequences are not physical, they are relational, and so thoughts are not physical. Words are not composed of letters, but arrangements and sequences of letters so they are relational also. Relationships are not physical. They are not composed of matter and/or energy.
Natural laws are not physical, they are relational. They are not composed of matter and/or energy. Scientific or natural laws govern the physical, but they are not physical.
Well,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe mind is quicker than the brain. The mind has more the numbers of degrees of freedom than the brain. Therefore, the delay between a decision, and consciousness, probabilistically.
Well,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet me increase weirdness of mental action. It is thinkable that the mind, and the brain are reflexive in the style, the mind-the brain-the mind. So that the brain may decelerate mental action, probably.
Arrangement=space. Sequence=time. Highly physical. Your argument would be like arguing that the universe is not physical because it is composed of arrangements and sequences of particles and forces.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBB,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe particles and forces are physical, but the arrangments and sequences are not. Since when are space and time physical? Are they made up of matter/energy? The famous equation E = mc squared demonstrates that time and space are not physical.
The universe is relational because matter and energy are relational. The universe is made up of the physical, which gives it substance, the intellectual, which gives it form, and the spiritual, which gives it meaning and purpose.
Thus the universe is made up of the material and non-material elements, which are all relational. If the universe were monistic, only physical, it would have no form, just substance.
I believe in free will as most psychologists do. But I doubt the theories of Scott and Hammeroff. What do solitons and quantum effects got to do with neurology? Nerve pulses are transmitted by animo acids and ions. These are governed by chemical reactions. Neurons are not semiconductors that have quantum effects. Solitons may be produced in internal vibrations of proteins but they are not involved in neurotransmission.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisApparently neurotransmission is described by Goldman equation and can be modeled as an RC circuit that follows Kirchoff's law. These are based on hydrodynamics and classical electrodynamics. I don't see where quantum effects and solitons come in.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAccording to general relativity, energy and mass cause spacetime to curve. This indicates that on a fundamental level there is an inextricable linkage between energy, mass, space, and time. Spacetime IS physical.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf time and energy are linked or related to, and are thus different from, mass and energy, then how can they be composed of mass and energy?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDo you have a definition of physical different from being composed of matter/energy?
A related question would be, if energy and mass are basically one, why is it important to know how they are linked, particularly when many materialists believe that thought is an illusion?
Matter and energy exist in time and space. Time and space are not physical.
"if energy and mass are basically one, why is it important to know how they are linked".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLinked is the wrong word. Energy & Mass are equivalent! It turns out that in physics that units were developed for both forms of matter (energy & mass). The e=mc squared equation is the conversion between the two.
Important? Well very useful to know the equivalence if one is converting mass into energy (eg a atomic bomb)!
Gadgetman,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou did not respond to my argument. Are energy and matter the same or different? Since it seems that they are different because they can be changed to one another, how can this happen if matter + energy = the universe? It would seem that there must be at least one more element to make this possible.
In the equation time/space is that element A strictly physical universe without time and space is static and without order.
Deep Blue defeated Kasparov in a chess tournament. Artificial intelligence beat human intelligence. In every game, Kasparov chose his best move in each and every move he made. He exercised his free will. Deep Blue also chose its best move in each and every move it made. Did it exercise free will?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo demonstrate his free will, Kasparov can choose the best move sometimes but not in other times. Deep Blue can have a random generator in its program so that it chooses the best move sometimes but not in other times. Did it demonstrate free will?
If you were playing chess online and didn't know your opponent, can you tell if you were playing against Kasparov or Deep Blue?
Computer scientists say if two things are indistinguishable, they are the same. That's the essence of the Turing test for artificial intelligence. Neurologists should learn from computer scientists.
Shannon, one of the founders of computer science, was asked if computers can think. He said sure I can think don't I?
There is certainly the possibility of choosing yes or now .. there are consequences to your choice ... so is that freedom .. probably not
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt seems to me that it is necessary to define what we mean by thinking. It is evident that chimps can solve problems by trial and error. Is that thinking, yes. I expect that Deep Blue is programed to do the same, the check all possible moves until his files determines the most effective one.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think the difference between humans and others is that we can determine several different choices that lead to several different possible outcomes and then we have the ability to choose which out come we want, rather than have our programing dictate the outcome and out mind determine the best way to get to that outcome.
Freedom is the ability to determine who we choose to be, rather than what is the best way to get there.
"can determine several different choices that lead to several different possible outcomes"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDeep Blue can do that. Each move leads to a different outcome.
"ability to choose which out come we want"
Deep Blue can do that too. The outcome that is most advantageous.
"rather than have our programing dictate the outcome"
But how do we choose the outcome that we want? The neural networks in the brain are a "hardware program" like in the original ENIAC computer. Current researchers in artificial intelligence are using neural network design in their robots.
"Freedom is the ability to determine who we choose to be"
How does the brain do that? Neurologists say perceptions can be altered by rewiring the neural networks in the brain. This is a feedback loop. Cause and effect can move in both directions.
We have no free will first recognized by philosopher Spinoza and not Leibniz as mention in this interview.Spinoza wrote "Men believe themselves to be free, simply because they are conscious of their actions,and unconscious of the causes whereby those actions are determined"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSane person experienced this bare truth in his everyday`s action.He if critically examine his action he he can find out how we are bondage of our inborn ed nature
Free will is opposite of determinism that is the only possible definition of the concept. I believe that thought process also involves quantum mechanics which is not completely deterministic in itself along with relativity which deals with fast moving particles has got some discrepancies. So we need a consistent foundation of physics along with its relationship with brain functioning to answer this question.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis interview is a joke. Not a single new idea is being introduced. Neuroscience has been in the same realm of false dichotomies and bone headed materialism for decades now. I'm not suggesting that neuroscientists shouldn't be asking important questions, only that they should reconsider the ways in which they are asking them and the methodologies they are using. All I see are the same old hammers and nails.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisi like pie
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI used to be quite fascinated by the supposed determinism vs. free will dichotomy, but now I think that the existence of "free will" has the same degree of logical certainty as the statement "I exist", in other words, essentially axiomatic ...and absurd to question. The obvious fact that it emerges from, and is dependent on a (probably deterministic, albeit of overwhelming complexity) physical brain is of great scientific interest. They both exist, let's figure out the mechanism. The mystery of "free will" is just one aspect of the more general mind-body mystery.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMeanwhile, I do not think this issue has any relevance whatsoever to the issue of of moral responsibility and how the legal system should operate. If there were no free will, then the people who are debating those issues have no free will either, their opinions are just as much a deterministic product of their brains, and they are thus not responsible for the penal system they design. A reductio-ad-absurdum.
Two comments:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst, until free will can be definitely falsified, actions (as opposed to beliefs) can only rationally be predicated on the assumption that it exists. If free will does not exist, then the outcomes of actions can't possibly matter. To whom would they matter? If free will does exist, though, the outcomes of actions do matter.
Second, I'm not sure what to make of this statement: "One becomes cognizant there is a system on top of the personal mind/brain layers which is yet another layer--the social world." I can't imagine that Gazzaniga believes that it's better for society to destroy the truth than for the truth to destroy a society. So I can only assume that he ranks the world of ideas superior to society, and the qualifying adjective "personal" in his statement makes an important distinction for him. The world of ideas is superior to society but, somehow, the individual mind is of a lesser order than society. Yet I can't quite see how this works, unless there's some kind of collective mind at work which, for me, is far too close to a ghost in the machine. (And, I expect, too close for Gazzaniga, as well.)
One more point -- I think the concept of free will vis-a-vis the determinism/free will issue is a different concept than the one pertaining to issues of moral/legal responsibility. The former is a metaphysical(?) concept, the latter a psych...ological concept. Metaphysical free will is binary -- either its true or not. Psychological free will can be a matter of degree depending on factors of nature (genetics) and nurture. Psychological free will presupposes metaphysical free will (see the reductio-ad-absurdum in my previous comment). It surprises me that the distinction between these two free will concepts doesn't seem to be more widely understood.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFree will as a legal responsibility is also a political concept. In other words, it's not necessarily the case that the legal line of responsibility has to match either the metaphysical or the psychological line. Law is more pragmatic than philosophy or psychology and, much as the SCOTUS decided that a fetus is not a "person" in the legal sense, the courts might also place the legal line of responsibility more conservatively (in the non-political sense) than psychology or philosophy would.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe illusion of free will is not necessarily something one wishes at all costs to preserve. On the contrary, we're always looking for causal factors to explain our actions, our decisions, our characters. The illusion of free will is forced on us, and itself therefore, apparently, determined. This circularity is the mise en abime that produces the in/explicableness that is consciousness with its propensity towards desire, or will. (That is, consciousness is that through which explanation takes place; explanation cannot be defined without a concept of the inexplicable; hence consciousness is both explicable and inexplicable. The feared ghost in the machine has not been sneaked in but was there before we were. The idea of cause is no less illusory than the sensation of freedom. One will not fade away without the other.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't understand why so many people like to call the things that are axiomatically obvious illusions!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome tart observations here:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2011/11/neuroscience-disclaimer.html
Siddhartha, the Buddha, has explored the mind over 6,000 years ago in "ABHIDHARMA". Has any of these Eurocentrists ever bothered to study "ABHIDHARMA" to understand the mind.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJagy
There's an article in the same magazine that contradicts this one about as called 'free will'. Just look: 'In the Minds of Others: Reading fiction can strengthen your social ties and even change your personality' - http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=in-the-minds-of-others&WT.mc_id=SA_WR_20111123
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf we look through the magazine and use simple logic we can see that there're a lot of contradicting points. Scientists, as other people including religious ones, do not care about logic, and jump on ether train - it here's rejecting of 'free will' in fashion - they will reject it. If defending of 'free will' becomes fashionable - they will find reasons and proofs to defend it. They care only about being seen and admired for how smart they are. Also for what kind of study they can get funding, etc., etc. Game as usual, throughout the ages.
I seem to agree with your observation, BENOLSON. I felt you would have use a softer Language. I can hardly differentiate you with the writer cause all of you are saying the same thing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoes this verse in the King James Version Ezra 7: 10[For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments] has any pointer to your opinion on free will?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWOW, the philosofers have now found that there are different people in the world and they do not think alike. Amasing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGautama Buddha lived in the sixth and fifth centures BCE, not 6000 years ago.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Freedom is the ability to determine who we choose to be"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow does the brain do that? Neurologists say perceptions can be altered by rewiring the neural networks in the brain. This is a feedback loop. Cause and effect can move in both directions.
Can an alcoholic choose to stop drinking? It seems to be the case. Can a thief choose to stop stealing? If not we should put all the crooks in jail and throw away the keys.
I chose to read these silly comments. How is it I do not have free will? Even if it is limited, sort of like a dog on a leash, I do have it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPeople do not understand the mind. They don't understand how a thought forms in the mind. Thinking you can understand free will without understanding these is ridiculous. Free will, should it exist, and apparently it does, follows the formation of mind. Which then do you have to understand first?
Social evolution might be a factor in how we decide, but it doesn't tell us how we decide.
My apologies....social evolution might tell us how we are influenced to decide, but it does not explain to us how we decide in the first place.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thislol, you're silly.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisgod's here. Party's over.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissorry, no matter what you say, there really is freewill-
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisfor the inoprative piece in this issue:
Beauty = truth = love = God/physics.
//
BINGO! We have our winner here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis person has hit all the salient points regarding the illusion of contra-causal free-will ... especially as regarding it's absolutely central role in propagating religious delusions.
Yes, the faith-biased are wedded to thread-bare notions of a free-willing etheral soul (originating from whence?) somehow supervening on our evolved phsycial brains, by some completely occult mechanism. Absurd.. and laughable if not for the fact that a majority of people believe in ghosts... angels... demons and other childish nonsense.
And yes... the Universe is either a fully deterministic one as it inexorably unfolds spacetime... or, totally random. QM doesn't alter determinism either... so don't even go there. Similarly, randomness doesn't get you free-will... only the "infinite drawing of lots".
We are indeed the proximate cause of actions and thus have "moral responsibility". But know this... there is a basis (genetic or developmental) for everything we do.
We are fully embedded in the evolving Cosmos, which should be understood and celebrated... and temper our arrogance as a specie. Deus sive Natura... it matters... not at all.
We are not able to predict a 3 ball linked pendulum's motion - its too complicated - let alone the Cosmos. It probably 'could' be worked out but there is nothing in the Cosmos powerful enough to do it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo we can never know the future. It may be mapped out for us but we cannot know it. Nor can anything, but why is it needed anyway? Its of no use.
The true randomness of quantum physics might make it also impossible given any size of calculator.
In a computer program such as The Sims we could not work out what its going to do without using 100 supercomputers to do it. Too many variables. And if we had a true random number generator (such as a decaying atom) we could never know the outcome of a simulation.