The Myth Of Free Will By: Seth Moris When one enters the realm of philosophy, in our day and age one cannot swing a stick without hitting the Free Will or Determinism debate. This is something I have personally come to ponder one quite a lot, and have essentially come to several opinions on the matter, which of course remain dynamic. I think that part of the reason re ason so many people, so often will ve hemently argue the objective existence of humans Free Will is because of the culture we as Americans are raised in. Combining the idea that Anyone and everyone under any and all circumstances can make it if they want to bad enough (Ie you are the complete and utter master of yourself) ties into The American Dream. Its something we are told and sold at a young age, and I think this is rather untrue and told to us as propaganda, to keep us happy. If we believe it, then if we are miserable it is our own fault. Ironically the same people who believe in Free Will more often than not will attribute outside forces with Why it all sucks. Another factor, for the widespread and unquestioned idea that we as humans possess Free Will is Christianity. Rather than being an observable phenomena, it would seem that simply people could not back a religion that punished punished one so severely on so many levels for so many, modernly arbitrary things, and it be out of our hands completely. We are punished for sin, because it is our fault that we sinned. God remains benevolent in peoples eyes (for those who repent, at least) and not an unfair bully. It is very similar to America punishing people. If we did not believe in Free Will, how would we feel sentencing people to the death penalty? But let us look at the two big concepts behind Free Wi ll. Freedom is often thought of as ability to do such and such, without someone /something stopping you. However it is also used to mean the degree of said freedom. fre edom. It could be said that in the common understanding of degre es of freedom that one may have more freedom if they can travel the w orld, and less if they reside in a state penitentiary. It is my understanding, and most peoples, that the Free in Free Wil l is the former definition. It is unconstrained ability to do Something. Will, in modern usage and in the concept of Fre e Will can be defined as consciously conceptualizing of an object/situation of desire and bringing it to fruition. Most people understand that you can will something to happen, and it may not happen. However when people speak of Free Will they are speaking of the ability to consciously conceptualize and bring to fruition the object/situation of their desire. That is what most people mean when they say Free Will, but we seem to be missing something. This is not Free Will, this is Will or what we think of as choice. For it to be defined as Free Will the parameters of both concepts Free and Will must be met. Under the common definition this is not met.
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For it to be Free Will it would have to be define d as Consciously conceptualizing of an object/situation of desire and without constraint or impediment the ability to bring said desire to fruition. This is under the parameters of simply referring to it as Free Will. If one is to observe humans, it should quickly become apparent that such is not the case. We have choice, but by simply existing in a state of consensual reality on any leve l, you are logically stripped of the ability to possess possess Free Will. Simply because outside forces are determining and acting upon your ability to manifest in reality the object of your desire, you do not have Free Will. But what about choice, isnt that Free Wi ll? Humans are essentially complex biomechanical beings. We have a very, very complex system of instincts, learned behavior, memory, and logic that determines what we do in response to given stimuli. The problem is that for humans it is hard to conceptualize of something that is very complex, and so we cop-out with the idea that w e are outside causality. Because, to have Fr ee Will, one must be outside of causality, which would be considered an outside force that would impede you bringing an object of desire to fruition. To be outside of causality would to be outside a complex system of instincts, learned behavior, etc. If Free Will existed, a human could do something Random. Not something that appears random to outsiders, or even to themselve s, but something that is literally not an effect of any cause. If one had ultimately unimpeded ability to manifest into reality that which they desire, the ability to perform a Random act would be available. However, consensually we can come to the opinion (because I do not say conclusion, conclusions breed stagnation) that some things are forced upon us. While we may be able to will ourselves to fly, I have not perceived of someone who has yet in my physical reality, and neither have I eve r seen evidence of this happening anywhere save through fifth to twentieth hand stories, or legends. This however starts to delve into the realm of the nature of reality, subjectivity vs objectivity and so on, and even should a person be able to cause me to perceive of them flying at will while contradicting laws of the physical world (and to me, perception is effectively reality), it still does not remove a few more problems. One such problem is that the concept of Fre e Will, and humans possessing it, would be that to do something random you would have to ac t without any kind of psychological prerequisite. Most proponents of Free Will would argue that I have the Free Will to cut off my penis with a knife, should I have said knife. However, only if certain factors are filled (ie someone threatening me with a gun to cut off my penis or be shot to death, threatening a loved one, etc) would I do that. Humans possess the ability to conceive of things without them happening, and this leads us to the fallacy that they can actually happen. They may be able to, but imagination/conceptualization is far from proof that we have such a thing as Free Will. Simply because I am aware (or at least perceiving of such
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testing Christians and Free Willards, decide to jump up and down strangely, spit on the floor, smack myself in the face and joyously proclaim proof of my Free Will, one can however usually find the prerequisite quite easily. Laughably in the aforementioned case, the psychological prerequisite needed to be filled to allow a human to do such actions is usually as simple as telling someone who believes in Free Will that they do not indeed have Free Will, which allows them to then perform such actions when they would not have done those things before. Lastly but far from least, comes the problem of Free Will being able to be random (it is free and unconstrained by anything after all, hypothetically) and also be what we would call Will. If F ree ree
anything would need to be able to exist beyond any constraints or impediments, then it would be
random. Outside of causality. causality. However, if we look at Free Will (Consciously conceptualizing of an object/situation of desire and without constraint or impediment the ability to bring said desire to fruition) how can something that is brought to fruition (ie You are the Cause, and You are under physical or psychological restraints) be Random and outside of causality? And if it cannot ( a restraint ) be Random how can it be Free (without any hindrance or constraint)? Upon careful, neutral observation, Free Will doesnt seem to manifest itself, only the illusion of Free Will, the fallacy of Free Will, and the myth of Free Will.
IA IA EL OH EL
