Does free will exist? It’s a question I hadn’t spent a lot of time on, but have been thinking about for the last week now.
I was visiting with friends and this question developed. Quickly I answered, “Yes.” However, as we talked and I began to defend my position, that it does exist, the argument was made that it doesn’t. And the more I think about it the more I might be convinced that it doesn’t exist.
Now, I usually don’t get into existential questions in my column, but I found this an interesting topic followed up by their very persuasive arguments. And because it’s now been on my mind for awhile, when I sat down to write my column it was all I could think about.
Essentially this was the argument against free will: Our brains are like super computers and as such can be programmed. This programming depends on genetics, but also on social conditioning which means that when a decision needs to be made that each one of us thinks we’re exercising free will in making a choice. However, this choice is something that you have arguably been programmed to make and despite consciously choosing this over that, which we construe as free will, is actually just a result of how we have been programmed through genetics and social conditioning.
Just like computers our brains can be reprogrammed and something we thought was true can be altered and our programming can change. Therefore, when a situation presents itself and a choice is needed to be made we unconsciously make the choice that we were programmed to despite being aware that we are making a decision.
An example of this would be the Fight or Flight response of animals, to either fight, run away, or freeze. Humans also have this response to situations. When we are presented with a situation requiring one of these responses we think that we have the ability to choose how to respond, which is free will. However, at the same time animals would respond in this way as well. Some would choose to run away, but if backed into a corner they no longer try to get away, they settle in to fight. They also make a decision.
Whether it’s a conscious decision on part of the animal reacting in these ways or if the difference is a human consciously makes a decision, it could be argued that the decision is ruled by genetics and social conditioning.
The idea of choice and exercising free will, the ability to choose how to act, is something that is said to set humans apart from animals, but how do we know that animals don’t consciously make choices?
A lab mouse is put into a maze and figures out how to get through it. Why does it choose to go one way or the other? They don’t all go to the right every time, they make choices. Once they figure out their path to their prize at the end of the maze they remember it and can redo the maze without error to the end. Is it consciously making the decision of which way to go?
So, does free will exist? It’s something I don’t think anyone can answer definitively, but it is interesting to think about.
