Free Will

[stuzal atla creala iuday]

I've been having difficulty understanding Ayn Rand's reconcilliation of Free Will and Cause and Effect. I understand that it has to do with the formation of concepts via the translation of perceptual/sensory data into more abstract connections within the mind of the perceiving individual but, I don't get how that translates to Free Will.

[aequalsa]

I've been having difficulty understanding Ayn Rand's reconcilliation of Free Will and Cause and Effect. I understand that it has to do with the formation of concepts via the translation of perceptual/sensory data into more abstract connections within the mind of the perceiving individual but, I don't get how that translates to Free Will.

The idea that really helped me sort that out was the problem of god as consciousness. "A consciousness conscious only of itself being a contradiction in terms."(paraphrase) Consciousness requires the ability to identify, which presupposes that there is something to identify.

The same applies to freewill. Being free means being free to choose something. So a being divorced from causation would also be incapable of choosing. There would be nothing to choose. Freewill has to happen inside the context of a physical universe which affects the chooser right back. Otherwise, to be free to make decisions without regard to circumstances would require that freewill be a power which is supernatural in nature. Granted by god, perhaps?

That all said, causation is not synonymous with determination. Causation and freewill can coexist. Freewill and determinism cannot. Unless you redefine determinism into some real "soft" form that is, at root, just an equivocation of causation.

[~Sophia~]

Free will IS a type of causation. It is when more than one effect is possible which refers to the man-made as metaphysical facts are unalterable by man (deterministic) - man can only re-arrange what exists but can not violate identity. No human choice and no product of human choice is metaphysically necessary (not inherent in the nature of existance). It could have been otherwise.

[Acount Overdrawn]

I've been having difficulty understanding Ayn Rand's reconcilliation of Free Will and Cause and Effect. I understand that it has to do with the formation of concepts via the translation of perceptual/sensory data into more abstract connections within the mind of the perceiving individual but, I don't get how that translates to Free Will.

The best resource in book form which explains free will is Dr. Peikoff's Objectivism: the Philosophy of Ayn Rand, which covers free will in Chapter 2.

To help you out, here's the part of the book which answers your question regarding Causality (Cause and Effect) and Free Will:

The law of causality by itself, therefore, does not affirm or deny the reality of an irreducible choice. It says only this much: if such a choice exist, then it, too, as a form of action, is performed and necessitated by an entity of a specific nature.

...

{T}he choice to focus could have been the choice not to focus, and vice versa. But the action itself, the fact of choosing as such, in one direction or the other, is unavoidable. Since man is an entity of a certain kind, since his brain and consciousness possess a certain identity, he must act in a certain way. He must continuously choose between focus and nonfocus. Given a certain kind of cause, in other words, a certain kind of effect must follow. This is not a violation of the law of causality, but an instance of it.

Here's some things I've said about free will, in the "Objectivism and determinism thread":

we learn about free will by the same means we learn about consciousness, by introspection [my thinking is that extrospection is involved in understanding consciousness, but one has to introspect to fully grasp what consciousness is]. Regarding consciousness, we introspect and realize that in order to do many of the actions we do in reality, and even to think of such things introspectively, we have to be conscious, that is, aware of reality. Regarding free will, we introspect and realize that some of the actions we perform, like thinking or having fun with friends, are freely chosen by us when other alternatives were possible; we make the choice for things to happen and for other things to not happen.

Have fun with your investigation!

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

I've been having difficulty understanding Ayn Rand's reconciliation of Free Will and Cause and Effect. I understand that it has to do with the formation of concepts via the translation of perceptual/sensory data into more abstract connections within the mind of the perceiving individual but, I don't get how that translates to Free Will.

Well, you have a confused starting point. Objectivism does not claim that free will comes about due to the ability to form concepts, but rather it is free will that makes concepts possible in the first place. In other words, we do not start off with concepts and then become beings of free will, we are beings that have free will -- which means we have the ability to focus our minds by choice -- and by an act of free will we conceptualize. In Objectivism, will and reason are the same thing, because freely choosing to focus is the root of rationality. If you do not choose to focus, then you will not be rational. Rationality is not automatic, being logical (non-contradictory identification of the facts of reality) is something that is done by choice; if you don't choose that, then you are irrational and you are not exercising your will.

And Objectivism has a different understanding of causation than the usual philosophy one hears today. The Objectivist understanding of causation does not say that antecedents lead to something happening, but rather an entity is what it is and does what it does because it is what it is. So, the fact of free will is there because we are what we are, and choosing to focus is a type of action that we can take because we are man. In other words, a man being a man is the cause of the action of being rational. But there is not an internal antecedent nor an external antecedent that leads to the choice that you make -- you make a choice, it's as simple as that. You caused yourself to make that choice of your own free will; that is an ability that we have because we are man.

[glibber]

In my mind the problem in the Free Will versus Determinism "Debate" is the degree to which words and contexts get tripped over.

With a sufficiently advanced imaging system one could see the neurons firing that are our emotions, feelings, thoughts etc, one could even see the neurons firing that are the choice to focus the mind. This observed biological world controls our reason and perception, drugs and physical modifications prove this. However if one "Wills" oneself to feel, think, or act it can be explained entirely as a determined physical process in the same way the apple falling from the tree was such a process. Looked at biologically, externally, there is no reason whatsoever a human is less determined than a clock.

When we talk about "Free Will" however we mean something different in a different context. It makes little sense to say "My grief is this chemical" or "My elation was that sequence of biological events" even though those statements are biologically true. When we talk about freedom or emotion or other states of mind we are entering into a different way of using language and thinking. Internally choice exists, we know it because we are the entity which both chooses and perceives that a choice took place. We know it as surely as we know what our senses are telling us. Freedom is not even a 'thing' that can be looked at, it is the condition our thoughts are in, omnipresent and coloring action and experience.

Try to think internally of not being free, of not being the active agent - it can't be done; try looking at the brain through the microscope and say it is not determined - it can't be done. When we make the change from external observation to internal observation and action the meanings of freedom and determinism shift, I don't see how one can be proven true and the other false.

Edited March 16, 2008 by glibber

[agrippa1]

In my mind the problem in the Free Will versus Determinism "Debate" is the degree to which words and contexts get tripped over.

With a sufficiently advanced imaging system one could see the neurons firing that are our emotions, feelings, thoughts etc, one could even see the neurons firing that are the choice to focus the mind. This observed biological world controls our reason and perception, drugs and physical modifications prove this. However if one "Wills" oneself to feel, think, or act it can be explained entirely as a determined physical process in the same way the apple falling from the tree was such a process. Looked at biologically, externally, there is no reason whatsoever a human is less determined than a clock.

When we talk about "Free Will" however we mean something different in a different context. It makes little sense to say "My grief is this chemical" or "My elation was that sequence of biological events" even though those statements are biologically true. When we talk about freedom or emotion or other states of mind we are entering into a different way of using language and thinking. Internally choice exists, we know it because we are the entity which both chooses and perceives that a choice took place. We know it as surely as we know what our senses are telling us. Freedom is not even a 'thing' that can be looked at, it is the condition our thoughts are in, omnipresent and coloring action and experience.

Try to think internally of not being free, of not being the active agent - it can't be done; try looking at the brain through the microscope and say it is not determined - it can't be done. When we make the change from external observation to internal observation and action the meanings of freedom and determinism shift, I don't see how one can be proven true and the other false.

Does it hurt sitting on the fence that way? The question of free will is not whether it feels free, but whether it is free. Your answer implies we are all automatons but just don't/can't know it. Objectivism rejects that answer.

Stazul, there's an extensive thread going on objectivism and determinism here, that you might find interesting.

Edited March 16, 2008 by agrippa1

[glibber]

Does it hurt sitting on the fence that way? The question of free will is not whether it feels free, but whether it is free. Your answer implies we are all automatons but just don't/can't know it. Objectivism rejects that answer.

Its not that I sit on the fence so much as to me its a either a false dichotomy (similar to asking whether music emotional expression or mere vibrations of cold inhuman air swirling through the void mechanistically mocking our human pretensions to meaning) or is an (at least through the history I know) unsolvable contradiction, in the sense that the two perspectives can not be unified (in the same way you can't see the shores of both sides of a river at once).

How is freedom any more obvious upon introspection then determinism upon external observation? I'm not saying we "feel" free any less than an observed neuron "looks" determined.

[Koustubh]

How is freedom any more obvious upon introspection then determinism upon external observation? I'm not saying we "feel" free any less than an observed neuron "looks" determined.

My limited understanding of physics says that it would be impossible to prove determinism for any system. If we cannot make accurate measurements of all relevant factors affecting a system, we can make no absolute predictions to verify.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Free will is not about the non-predictability of a complex system. It is not as if we are so complex that we are actually determined but due to the complexity we "feel" as if we have free will. That your will is free -- that you have the choice to focus and to be rational -- is not an illusion. It is a fact of the nature of man. And it is an epistemologically fundamental fact about man. By introspection -- which is a direct observation about the workings of our mind -- we know that we have free will, that we can make choices, that we can think and act according to our knowledge or evade it and go on "cruise control". And no amount of knowledge about physics or biochemistry can override that directly observable fact about man's nature.

Those of you continuing to claim that man cannot have free will because he is made of matter are holding onto a contradiction, that's why it can't be resolved in your manner of trying to understand existence and man's place in it. The resolution is that introspection is valid; that via introspection we know that we make choices. It is you trying to ignore or evade that fact that leads to your contradictory stance -- that man is no more volitional than a clock, he's just more complicated -- directly contradicts what you know about yourself; and that you hold that stance of your own free will. Those of you posting against free will are taking that stance of your own free will. You chose to post; you chose to get involved in this discussion. Your biochemistry and your neurons did not cause you to do that with no volitional effort on your part.

Of course, there have been people posting on this board who claim that they have seen medical scans of their brains and concluded that they don't have a mind because they can't see it on that medical scan. Poor bastards. But if you want to claim that you don't have a mind and that it is not volitional, and that you have "rationally" come to that conclusion, then please choose not to post in this thread where some of us are trying to help someone new to Objectivism to understand Objectivism.

[glibber]

... ... please choose not to post in this thread where some of us are trying to help someone new to Objectivism to understand Objectivism.

While your post makes me want to, I'll not reply here. Though I fear you missed my point if the post was directed at me.

[Acount Overdrawn]

When we talk about "Free Will" however we mean something different in a different context.

This isn't a linguistic issue: Determinist apply their unproved notion to everything which exists, and conclude that free will is impossible, or at least this is what the more honest Hard Determinists do. A Hard Determinist would say that in all contexts you are determined: free will has no meaning or reality.

But I object completely to their approach, because I object to their view of cause-and-effect which underlies it. Because their view of cause-and-effect is wrong, everything else built upon it, such as their theory, is also wrong. Nothing to me acts "deterministically": things do however act according to their identities.

Even if you knew my entire biology and psychology, I would argue that you could not invariably predict every action I would make thereafter by studying my biological state, then my action, then my state again, then my action action, etc., which is what Determinists posit that they can do (unless they are of the Environmental Determinism persuasion or some other variant). My ability to choose to focus is a first cause; it isn't determined by my previous neural state (assuming a functioning mind, and a non-functioning one would only hamper or destroy the ability to focus).

There hasn't been one theory of Determinism which was ever proven, which explains why there are so many different theories about how exactly we're determined.

But then again, this has nothing to do with the original topic.

@stuzal atla creala iuday: to understand what Objectivism means by cause-and-effect, you have to step away from the Determinist definition which is used normally and consider the issue afresh.

[stuzal atla creala iuday]

That helped a lot. As for one of my commentors, what I meant by the integration of concepts is that the volitional focusing of one's mind allows for the practice of Occam's Razor via not focusing on things irrelevant and/or contradictory to the concept being formed/used.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

That helped a lot. As for one of my commentors, what I meant by the integration of concepts is that the volitional focusing of one's mind allows for the practice of Occam's Razor via not focusing on things irrelevant and/or contradictory to the concept being formed/used.

Yes, well that is true. But it is very important to realize that it is volition or free will that makes it possible for one to integrate by epistemological essentials (basically similarities within a context). Animals can focus their minds onto particular objects in reality, like a cat zooming in or a bird to pounce on; but it has no awareness of its own mind. Because man does have awareness of his own mind and can direct it of his own free will, he too can pounce in a sense, but pounce on something internal and capture it in a concept. Without free will, we would still have awareness of existence and we would still have memories, but we would not be able to recall our memories selectively, and we would not be able to selectively focus in on our various levels of awareness and mentally isolate and then mentally integrate the world we observe, including integrating aspects of our consciousness.

The ability of free will is at the root of man's actuality and his potential to become increasingly more rational regarding everything in existence. In other words, without free will, man would just be able to operate on the perceptual level, like animals.The conceptual level rests on volitionally focusing in or a subject and mentally disregarding that which is irrelevant to the subject.

[Acount Overdrawn]

That helped a lot. As for one of my commentors, what I meant by the integration of concepts is that the volitional focusing of one's mind allows for the practice of Occam's Razor via not focusing on things irrelevant and/or contradictory to the concept being formed/used.

Just keep in mind that free will isn't limited to concept-formation, though that is a key ability as far as human beings are concerned (I think this is what Thomas was basically saying). If you know this, then just ignore my post.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Just keep in mind that free will isn't limited to concept-formation, though that is a key ability as far as human beings are concerned (I think this is what Thomas was basically saying).

Yes, I wasn't trying to imply that free will only covered concept formation. Volition is the root of man's abilities, not only to form concepts but to do everything else that a man is capable of doing of his own free will. Driving, for example, or cruising the Internet, watching TV, posting replies. In fact, it is only because of free will that a man can be virtuous at all, since the Objectivist virtues come down to volitionally adhering to existence in thought and action. Taking the facts into account must be done volitionally, and organizing them via non-contradictory identification (logic) must be done volitionally.

While man does have a subconscious that he cannot directly program (unlike a computer), he does have volitional access to checking his premises and seeing if his emotional responses are based on the facts or something else. Untangling his confusions is something that must be done volitionally. And if one finds oneself in a contradiction, one must resolve it volitionally.

One has to get up to go to work in the morning volitionally; or do one's shopping; or any of the myriad other things that a man does on a daily bases.

[stuzal atla creala iuday]

I think that just about fixes my misinterpretation of Free Will.

[dicktar]

Free will is not about the non-predictability of a complex system. It is not as if we are so complex that we are actually determined but due to the complexity we "feel" as if we have free will. That your will is free -- that you have the choice to focus and to be rational -- is not an illusion. It is a fact of the nature of man. And it is an epistemologically fundamental fact about man. By introspection -- which is a direct observation about the workings of our mind -- we know that we have free will, that we can make choices, that we can think and act according to our knowledge or evade it and go on "cruise control". And no amount of knowledge about physics or biochemistry can override that directly observable fact about man's nature.

Just because I appear (to myself) to have freedom of choice between choosing McDonald's over Wendy's, or becoming an architect or becoming a drug dealer, it doesn't follow that I actually have such a choice. Subconscious desires and motives exist despite our inability to directly perceive them.

Further, consider the flip-side of your position: should I consider every "directly observable fact" about my nature as metaphysically given? This is an interesting question for Rand's philosophy generally, because her answer seems different when we consider a person's love of vanilla ice cream vs. that persona's love of Beethoven. (ie, one is taken as a meaningless whim and the other as an indication of a person's worldview)

[Seeker]

Just because I appear (to myself) to have freedom of choice between choosing McDonald's over Wendy's, or becoming an architect or becoming a drug dealer, it doesn't follow that I actually have such a choice. Subconscious desires and motives exist despite our inability to directly perceive them.

That your will is free can be validated simply by noticing that when you choose to vary your level of mental focus, what you choose in that instant is not necessitated by any antecedent mental factors. Furthermore your ability to know that stands at the very root of self-knowledge and is axiomatic - you must accept the validity of introspection to make any claims about your mind, including claims denying that you have free will. Your argument is self-refuting.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Subconscious desires and motives exist despite our inability to directly perceive them.

<snip>

Should I consider every "directly observable fact" about my nature as metaphysically given?

The advocacy of free will in Objectivism does not deny the workings of the sub-conscious nor does it deny that there may be physiological factors involved in what one likes to eat or smell; it does, however, observe that one has a will that can turn towards a consideration of the facts (choose to be rational) or a will to turn away from a consideration of the facts (choose to be irrational). Because of the nature of man's mind, which can only be validated introspectively, one is aware that one can use one's mind to observe the facts and be rational about them; or settle with the default position of just letting one's sub-conscious rule one, which does not require volitional effort.

For example, I am a smoker, and I really enjoy it, especially when I am writing. Though there is nicotine addiction involved in my decision to keep smoking, I can still choose to act against the sub-conscious habit of smoking and the physiological addiction, if I choose to do that. For me, the pleasure of smoking outweighs the slight possibility that I might get lung disease, since it has not been shown that smoking necessarily leads to lung disease or heart problems. But it is something I really enjoy, so I am not consciously motivated to stop smoking; but people do that, and nicotine is supposedly one of the most difficult physiological addictions to break. I don't know about that either, as my father quit smoking before there were any patches or pills to take away the physiological urge to smoke.

The point is that we have control over what we do consciously; what to consider and how to consider it are open to our choice; and to focus or unfocus our minds. That is what free will means in Objectivism.

And while we do not have direct programming access to our sub-conscious, with volitional effort and the right method, one can change even that by an act of will to act against an emotion or a programming or a psychological association.

For example, say one gets a new computer or a new car. The old automatized reactions we have to using those devices are no longer adequate for using the new models. So, what do we do? We focus more consciously on where we put our feet and how hard we turn the wheel or which virtual button to push. And then that becomes automatized and we can just do it by routine. If the sub-conscious ruled us, we wouldn't be able to do that by our own effort.

As to whether or not that which we observe (introspectively or extrospectively) is the metaphysically given; yes, it is. That which we observe are the facts of reality. Now this doesn't mean that if we observe the fact that we are having an emotional reaction that we must then follow it because it is the given, but it does say that emotions are real, due to the fact that we observe them. And if you can observe that you have emotions or that you have a sub-conscious, then the conscious mind, being that much easier to access, means that you ought to be able to tell that you are replying to this thread of your own free will.

In other words, if you are going to claim that you have a sub-conscious, well one cannot do that without first having observed the conscious mind and that we introspect what we do with our minds of our own free will.

So I agree with the previous poster that your argument is self-refuting.

[Capitalism Forever]

Moderator's Note:

If anyone wishes to positively argue against the existence of volition, he should do so in the Debate Forum, since that is an idea contrary to Objectivism.

[Rounin]

While this is probably a slight digression from the original topic, I don't believe it's necessary to agree with or understand Rand's views on Free Will to agree with Objectivism's general tenets. In fact, I believe the importance of Free Will is severely overstated in general.

Consider the hypothetical case of a man stealing an apple. If we suppose that there's no such thing as Free Will, the man can correctly claim that his stealing the apple was merely the result of an unfortunate chain of causation. However, what does that mean in practice?

Very little. When we hold people responsible for the consequences of their actions (such as stealing apples), the actions we're holding them responsible for are always inevitable, since they've already been carried out and are in the past, whether they were inevitable at the time (determinism) or not (Free Will). When we respond to such actions, for instance by punishing the man who stole an apple, the response is meant not to alter the past, but to alter the likelyhood of similar actions being carried out in the future. Whether we actually have a free will or are just acting out a chain of events that's completely pre-determined, our response can still be observed to have an effect upon the future course of the man's life.

What about the difference between people who willingly commit crimes, and people who commit crimes due to insanity or other circumstances beyond their control? Under a deterministic worldview, all circumstances could be considered to be beyond our control, but this doesn't change the fact that different types of causes require a different type of response. The people most likely to be dissuaded from criminal behaviour by punishment would still be eligible for punishment, whereas those most likely to respond favourably to psychiatric treatment would be eligible for that kind of response.

In short, the practical differences between non-deterministic and deterministic worldviews aren't applicable to actual situations. The idea of the universe as a fully deterministic system is interesting as a thought experiment, but in actual fact it doesn't free anyone from the ownership of and responsibility for his own life.

Edited July 12, 2008 by Rounin

[Marc K.]

I don't believe it's necessary to agree with or understand Rand's views on Free Will to agree with Objectivism's general tenets. In fact, I believe the importance of Free Will is severely overstated in general.

Nope, sorry, if you don't accept that man possesses free will, that pretty much shoots down the whole thing. You'd be denying our true nature as volitional beings -- metaphysics. No volition = no knowledge -- epistemology. Morality is only applicable if one can choose what to do, morality does not apply to animals -- ethics. How can you punish someone if they had no choice in the matter, they had to do it, it was inevitable? -- politics. Why paint if you can't choose to show what you value? -- esthetics.

In short, the practical differences between non-deterministic and deterministic worldviews aren't applicable to actual situations. The idea of the universe as a fully deterministic system is interesting as a thought experiment, but in actual fact it doesn't free anyone from the ownership of and responsibility for his own life.

Don't you care about what is true and what is false? Especially something which is available to your direct perception? To deny free will is to evade reality and deny your true nature -- which is your choice.

[softwareNerd]

... I believe the importance of Free Will is severely overstated in general.

Consider the hypothetical case of a man stealing an apple....

Well and good; but, now, look inward. Consider the hypothetical case of whether you should steal an apple.

Whether you accept Islam, Christianity or Objectivism, there's a some answer to that question: "should I steal an apple?" The answer may depend on context etc., but each ethical theory provides some methodology -- some way to figure out the right action. If one truly accepts determinism in the sense of having no control over whether or not to steal the apple, what relevance does Christianity, or Objectivism, or any other ethical theory have to such a question? If you accept determinism in the sense that studying some such theory is not going to change your behavior, then the theory is moot. In that sense, the theory only makes sense if one accepts that one has at least some type of choice.

Every ethical theory -- every theory that says "do this" or "don't do that" -- comes with the assumption that you can actually follow the mandates, at least to some extent. Christianity has to accept free-will in some sense, otherwise the injunction not to sin is meaningless.

That's the way that ethics depends on free-will of some type. If you look at the details of epistemology, it's the same thing, but with an "is" focus rather than an "ought" focus. Any theory that helps one to think better and understand the world better, assumes that you have a choice to think one way or another.

Edited July 12, 2008 by softwareNerd

[Rounin]

Every ethical theory -- every theory that says "do this" or "don't do that" -- comes with the assumption that you can actually follow the mandates, at least to some extent. Christianity has to accept free-will in some sense, otherwise the injunction not to sin is meaningless.

Yes — If you wanted to, you could restate my previous post as saying that determinism doesn't disprove Free Will, because even if our behaviour was completely deterministic and could theoretically be predicted in advance by an omniscient observer, the world is still be experienced by us in a manner that appears to us to be non-deterministic, and we should thus behave accordingly. Whether one looks upon choice as a purely deterministic process involving input and output or as a non-deterministic process involving several possible outcomes has no significance beyond the realm of theory, because even an ardent determinist has to recognise that choices exist and that how one chooses will affect the future.

Edited July 12, 2008 by Rounin