is free will free?

man's quest to understand God

Hello Friends,

After some thorough thought, I have decided that the only way for this essay to be concise and focused (not that any of my essays are either of these things) is to zoom in exclusively on the two most compelling arguments regarding these issues.

I recall one evening when I was praying to God because the question was on my mind so much. On further reflection, this is a strange thing to bring before God, but I guess you could say I was exercising my free will? Or was I?

Anyways, that day, I opened the book Quantum A Guide for the Perplexed by Jim Al-Khalili, who bluntly informed me that “‘fate’ as a scientific idea was proven to be false three-quarters of a century ago.” But if there is anything I’ve understood about the nature of everything, it is that nothing is as simple as that. There are numerous exceptions or opposing theories that undercut almost everything. Al-Khalili explains that in the realm of the quantum exists indeterminism, which is a “fundamental feature of nature itself”. The simplest example is radioactive decay; “identical initial examples lead to different outcomes”. People who insist that this is an example of indeterminism argue that since all we can do is estimate the probability that only half the nuclei will have decayed over time, not when they will actually decay. They argue that since there are no hidden variables, it must be random since none of the variables can account for the exact way it decays. So, essentially, they extrapolate this. If brain processes involve quantum events and there is no predetermined outcome, then there may be room for free will.

14 years ago, Michio Kaku, in a video on the Big Think channel, Why Physics Ends the Free Will Debate, pointed to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, which underlines that you can never know the exact position of a particle; in fact, it could be in multiple places at once. This eliminated a more Newtonian approach, which was that the position of a particle at any given moment could be determined, i.e. determinism. However, according to Kaku, this would mean that if someone were a murderer, it wasn’t their fault because it was predetermined; we could see that they would become a murderer, so why should they be put in jail for something that was entirely outside of their control? The most fascinating quote was how Einstein was frustrated with Heisenberg’s conclusions: “God doesn’t play dice”. Enstein’s view, according to Slavoj Žižek, was that “science itself is sustained by the deep faith that our universe is marvellously arranged in a harmony that pervades all that exists”, thus pointing to “Spinoza’s God”. Žižek spoke about this in a speech he gave at a conference in Waterloo (Canada) on June 5th of this year, dedicated to the work of Lee Smolin.

My philosophical discussions often intersect with numerous other genres of knowledge, and it’s challenging to become acquainted with a variety of other disciplines. I must emphasise that with my growing knowledge, I become increasingly convinced of the interconnectivity. And so I decided to take a brief break to emphasise that perhaps the disciplines regarded as more intellectually rigorous, e.g., quantum mechanics, are necessary to comprehend in the pursuit of universal truth. I know I said this essay was going to be focused, but this coincides perfectly with a podcast I listened to today by Alex O’Connor’s podcast, Within Reason, with Marcus du Sautoy as a guest. They explored how mathematics pervades the arts in a myriad of ways, for instance, through frequencies in music. The two discuss how Shakespeare was obsessed with mathematics, how he utilised different numerical flavours to generate specific effects and how he typically utilised even-numbered syllables for lines, but when he wanted to really grab the reader’s attention to move them, he used an odd number, for instance, his famous line “to be or not to be, that is the question” wakes the reader out of the pattern of 10 syllables with an uncomfortable 11 syllables which translates to a certain potency. And so you have it, mathematics at the heart of art. Quantum mechanics is at the heart of philosophy.

Anyway, all these scientists have told us that there is no such thing as fate. However, it’s interesting; I stumbled upon an article on the New Scientist app by Karmela Padavic-Callaghan suggesting that these new experiments by these new scientists will reveal the truth. I bet they said that about Newton. Anyway, without getting lost in the details, this piece explains that science may be able to conclude that we may have partial free will.

Okay, I am done explaining that theory. I think this approach fails due to the mind-brain duality. While the mind may not be separate from the brain in itself, the mind may transcend the brain; since the functioning of the mind and the emergence of consciousness are largely unknown, how can we use quantum processes (which are also largely a mystery) to explain free will — which is likely a mind-function. That being said, I suspect that due to the failure of our current approach to ascertain the mind’s workings, it could be argued that the mind is too vast for our current toolkit, and the quantum simply would not apply. This is a suspicion. Further, unpredictability is just that. Unpredictability. I struggle to grapple with how unpredictability leaves room for free will. If you never know when a ball will hit you, how can you expect to dodge it?

So, I got burnt out with science and turned to its even more confounding half-sibling: philosophical discussion. Born of the same mother, but I swear their fathers couldn’t be more dissimilar.

The most convincing argument was Sam Harris’s claim that, in any case, free will isn’t free. His most central claims are outlined in his book Free Will. He argues that if your actions are determined, they are inevitable, and if your actions are indetermined, then they are not your own; they are random. The entire premise of his argument is the law of the excluded middle (LEM). This principle says that for any proposition P, either P is true or not-P is true (P ∨ ¬P). Therefore, things are either determined or indetermined. The most convincing explanation I’ve heard is from Alex O’Connor. He argues that if some external force predetermines your actions, then they’re obviously not free. But even if they come from something internal, like your soul or subconscious, that doesn’t solve the problem because you didn’t choose the nature of your soul. If your soul determines your actions, but causes outside your control shape your soul, then your choices are still not truly yours. And if we keep tracing the chain back, the soul determined by deeper traits, those traits determined by something else, we end up in the same place: a causal chain, not free will.

So, I guess my two objections to the foundations of this argument are also the icing on the cake. Either P is true, or not-P is true. I don’t find this a good foundation. P can be true and untrue simultaneously. My problem with LEM is that real life has many exceptions; it is not binary, and there are numerous in-betweens all the time. Binary thinking is the bane of my existence. Take, for instance, the idea of hating something but being addicted to it because of the pleasure it gives you; paradoxes exist. Additionally, Many truths exist in tension. In Hegelian terms, a thing can be itself and its opposite, thesis and antithesis, held together until a synthesis emerges. If freedom is essential, as a starting point, and we discover that structure and rules are necessary, these two truths, while opposing, come together to form a progressive conclusion: Freedom necessitates structure and regulation.

Regarding the icing, I think this argument holds when you have a unified and narrow definition of the self. If your self is your consciousness, then your mind presents options to you, and you make a decision based on those, but then arises the question: what about desires? You can’t control your cravings; when you want something, you want it regardless of whether you know you shouldn’t. But that’s not to say that your desires are not your own, but rather, your desires oppose logic, but that’s the very nature of intuition. I think Harris and O’Connor are treating your desires as external to you, but your desires bleed from the deeper strata of who you are. Our conflicting impulses are parts of the same inner architecture.

I don’t have a conclusion. I have critiques. Thank you for reading; I hope this essay does not give you any closure. I hope this essay prompts you to reconsider any closure you have with this existential question and forces you to reexamine your beliefs. I also hope you have a mild headache from this piece because I have one too.

With love,

Alinda