Let me start with the defintion of the
term ‘free will’. One of the misconceptions in the meaning of the term is to
think of free will as freedom to do what one wants to do. I am not talking
about such a definition. I am talking about why does one ‘want’ to do
something? Is that wanting free? This definition is philosophically the most
relevant one for me. It is the ability of human beings to choose freely, without
any cause whatsoever. Not only the biggest of decisions, even a simple choice.
For example, if you are choosing between two of the most favorite food items
for the dinner, do you exercise free will?
Modern science says almost certainly
that there is no free will. This is because of two main reasons. Let me
elaborate.
1.
Choices are ‘deterministic’: If
the universe works according to the physical laws, i.e., everything is cause
and effect according to the deterministic physical laws, like collision of one
particle cause the other to move and so on. If the initial conditions are known,
everything in the universe can be determined. Since chemistry is just complex
physics, biology is jus complex chemistry, human choice is just a product of complex
biology in brain level. So everything is just blind physical process and hence,
the process of human choice cannot be free. Choices can’t come out of the blue
and there is no need of anything like a soul or supernatural. Right upto to the
firing of final neuron that makes the choice, every single thing is according
to physical laws. Simply put, the human choices are ‘deterministic’. There will
be some reason for you to decide on one food item for the dinner over the
other. However subtle it is, there will be a cause. The knowledge of extra
spiciness or the ease of digestion etc., meaning the choices are ultimately
deterministic. Even if the reason is not obvious, even if you get the feeling
of freely choosing, the latest neuroscience says, it is only a post-hoc story
your conscious mind tells itself about something that was already decided
subsconsciously. So there is always a causal chain. i.e., The previous state of
the universe ‘determines’ the current state. On the other hand, science itself
provides another view. The most fundamental pillar of modern science, the
particle physics, says, the human choices can not be deterministic but random.
Let’s unpack.
2.
Choices are ‘random’: Particle physics
tells that randomness and probabilities underly the working of the universe. For
example, an electron is not surely present at a location but only ‘a
probability’ of its presence can be talked about. Its position is actually
random and cannot be determined. It means that the previous state of the
universe is not the cause for the current state. The current state happens
ramdomly among numerous other choices of states. No causal chain. Therefore, if an electron is
present in one location, the final neuron firing for a human choice will be
something but if the electron is not present there, then the choice would be
different. Going with the same example as before, the choice of food item is
because of just randomness of subatomic level actions changing the final neuron
firing. Now the question is, does that mean humans have free will? No, it just
says nothing is deterministic but everything is ‘random’. So, this
understanding also simply discards the free authorship of choice.
In summary, whether human choices are either
deterministic or random, there is no scope of free will.
Alright. Then no one can be held
accountable for their mistakes, including serial killers and pedophiles.
Punishment would lose its meaning. Likewise, no one could claim responsibility
for their achievements or moral virtues.
How does it make you feel? Pessimistic? Is
it even a healthy thing to understand about our reality? The most pressing
question is, will it not make people act more immorally? What is the way
forward?
The optimistic way forward involves understanding
more. You see, even if people understand that scientifically there are compelling
reasons to believe that there is no free will, in daily life, even those people
act as if free will exists. Neuroscience show that by certain training it is
possible to be optimistic about moral behaviour. Consider the following
experiment. The experiment tested whether beliefs about free will affect
honesty. Students were primed with one of the two messages. One group recived messages
of “no free will”, we are just part of mechanistic universe and so on. The
other group recieved “Yes there is free will” messages, that we can make
conscious moral choices. Then all the students were given an exam on some
general subject, but they were left alone to grade their own tests and pay
themselves according to their marks. The result: Students who were primed to
believe they had no free will, consistently cheated more, taking extra money
they didn't earn. Therefore, we can conclude that ‘believing’ you're just a
pawn of physical laws either gives you an excuse for bad behavior, "don't
blame me, I have no free will” or simply drains the willpower needed to resist
temptation.
A researcher compares it to sailing: you can't control the wind or currents
in the ocean, but you can set your course and largely end up where you want to
go. He argues that while science has revealed much about consciousness and
physics, we should be cautious about dismissing free will entirely, because
believing in it clearly matters, practically speaking.
So whether free will is real or an
illusion may be less important than the fact that believing in it makes us more
moral, more responsible, and more motivated to shape our own lives. As much as
possible we should think that we are free to choose and we are responsible for
our actions. It has real positive consequence backed by experiments.
There is another interesting dimension
to this. We discussed so much on human choices, but what about human creativity? (If you think AI
can do it, think again after reading the rest of this article). For example, consider
the creation of theory of relativity. It is an hypothesis that was created by
Einstein that explains many experimental observations. For the problems
Einstein had, his creativity has hit an answer. The answer is not ‘random’ but the
opposite of it. Because a random answer cannot be the right answer. If it is
determistic, it must be predictable and any prediction first requires the laws.
Now, here the law itself is reached by the creativity of a human. Then in
principle it could not be predicted before hand by even the most
advanced of computers since it can only model and simulate things based on the available laws. If its AI, it too works only based on the avialable data and the laws. So the right unknown laws can never be predicted. Will creativity eventually reach laws according to which
creativity itself operates? we may never know but what is undeniable is the act of creativity makes humans incredibly
important. The knowledge created by such creativity has causal power to
rearrange the physical universe in ways that would otherwise be astronomically
unlikely. It can convert things that aren't resources into resources. If
problems are inevitable in the universe for humas, solutions can come from only
human creativity to solve problems. And that is profoundly optimistic.
