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diff --git a/content/entry/free-will-is-incoherent-part-1.md b/content/entry/free-will-is-incoherent-part-1.md index 15424d2..4c5c95c 100644 --- a/content/entry/free-will-is-incoherent-part-1.md +++ b/content/entry/free-will-is-incoherent-part-1.md @@ -2,13 +2,12 @@ title: "Free Will is Incoherent - Part 1" date: 2020-06-19T00:00:00 draft: false -makerefs: false --- # Preface -Before you read what I have to write about free will, you should know that I agree fully with what Sam Harris[1] has written on the subject. I'm just going to be reiterating things he has said in my own words with some of my own observations. So if you are familiar with his words on the topic, I recommend skipping this post. +Before you read what I have to write about free will, you should know that I agree fully with what [Sam Harris](https://samharris.org/the-illusion-of-free-will/) has written on the subject. I'm just going to be reiterating things he has said in my own words with some of my own observations. So if you are familiar with his words on the topic, I recommend skipping this post. # What is Free Will? -For me to explain why free will is incoherent, I must first define it. The definition I am using is this: Free will is the capacity for conscious agents to do otherwise. For example, I ate vanilla ice cream. I could have eaten chocolate instead, or so it seems. This is the definition most closely aligned with what people understand free will to mean and the first one you will find on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy[2]. +For me to explain why free will is incoherent, I must first define it. The definition I am using is this: Free will is the capacity for conscious agents to do otherwise. For example, I ate vanilla ice cream. I could have eaten chocolate instead, or so it seems. This is the definition most closely aligned with what people understand free will to mean and the first one you will find on the [Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/). # Knock Down Argument I'm going to come at free will as I have defined it from several perspectives. First, I want to present a knock down argument against it. Usually, there are two sides to an issue or at least some gray area. But with free will, this is not so. Any fool can easily see it makes no sense even with a basic understanding of physics or logic. The argument against free will goes like this: @@ -54,18 +53,9 @@ When I say free will is incoherent, what I mean is it's impossible to conceive o If you ask someone that doesn't philosophize all day long what free will is, they might tell you it's the ability to choose. But what does it mean to make a choice? The problem has been pushed back a step because now we have to define what a choice is. If you ask them again, "What is a choice?", they may respond saying it's a decision. And then you can ask "Let's get very precise here since it is philosophy after all. What exactly is a decision"? And you can go on and on like this. The problem is any time they use the word "choice" or "decision", they are unknowingly sneaking in free will. Anecdotally, I have never had someone give me a satisfactory explanation to that inquiry. It was always replacing "choice" with "decision" or vice versa. I never did get to the bottom of it and it's always the same conversation. This leads one to believe that free will isn't really concrete at all. It's a vague idea that people think they understand. But when challenged, they can't explain what it physically means. # Compatibilism -There is a philosophical position called compatibilism which I should mention. Not everyone uses the same definition of free will as I have used in my argument. Compatibilists claim that free will is compatible with determinism by redefining the term "free will". I don't really consider this worth arguing against since no one thinks of or uses the word free will in that sense. Immanuel Kant[3] called it "word jugglery" and William James[4] pejoratively referred to it as "soft determinism". +There is a philosophical position called compatibilism which I should mention. Not everyone uses the same definition of free will as I have used in my argument. Compatibilists claim that free will is compatible with determinism by redefining the term "free will". I don't really consider this worth arguing against since no one thinks of or uses the word free will in that sense. [Immanuel Kant](https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant) called it "word jugglery" and [William James](https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James) pejoratively referred to it as "soft determinism". Our cosmos as we currently understand it isn't even deterministic, so the compatibilist also has to claim that a random cosmos is compatible with free will as well. This means a cosmos which is, at bottom, behaving in a random fashion somehow gives you free will. Free will also can't be an emergent property of determinism or randomness, so the compatibilist position is just a failed attempt at redefining common parlance to win an argument. # Conclusion -I have shown that free will is an incoherent idea and addressed some common arguments in favor of it. It's easy to despair after reading this post. In the next and final post, I want to show that the lack of free will is not something to despair about. It can actually be a source of compassion. It has important implications for how we think about responsibility as I have hinted at in my past post[5] on individual responsibility. It has huge implications for the US criminal justice system. I would suggest collecting some thoughts of your own and drawing your own conclusions about what this means for our society as an exercise before you go on to read the next part. It does take me a lot of work to put these ideas out expressed in a clear way. So, if you find value in my posts, send a donation (details on my about page[6]). - - -Link(s): -[1: https://samharris.org/the-illusion-of-free-will/](https://samharris.org/the-illusion-of-free-will/) -[2: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/](https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/) -[3: https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant](https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant) -[4: https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James](https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James) -[5: /2020/04/10/the-victim-mentality-versus-individual-responsibility](/2020/04/10/the-victim-mentality-versus-individual-responsibility/) -[6: /about](/about/) +I have shown that free will is an incoherent idea and addressed some common arguments in favor of it. It's easy to despair after reading this post. In the next and final post, I want to show that the lack of free will is not something to despair about. It can actually be a source of compassion. It has important implications for how we think about responsibility as I have hinted at in [my past post on individual responsibility](/2020/04/10/the-victim-mentality-versus-individual-responsibility). It has huge implications for the US criminal justice system. I would suggest collecting some thoughts of your own and drawing your own conclusions about what this means for our society as an exercise before you go on to read the next part. It does take me a lot of work to put these ideas out expressed in a clear way. So, if you find value in my posts, send a donation (details on my [about page](/about)). |