It seemed appropriate to break this section off into a separate thread.
Dan Minette said:
> To me, the meaning of ethics is strongly tied up to our free will. An
> earthquakes is not immoral. If we have no more control of our actions
> than a hurricane, than how can we be moral or immoral? While there have
> been some believers in predestination, most ethical systems I know of
> presuppose that we actually have some volition. Can you point to a
> system in Western philosophy that presupposes that all of our actions
> are forced, and yet develops a system of ethics?
Even believers in predestination, as far as I know, assume that people
have some personal responsibility (Calvinists still punish their
children, I presume). And I would agree with you that our
moral systems, in the West anyway, assume freedom of the will. And no, I
don't know offhand of any western moral systems that utterly deny this
doctrine.
On the other hand, I would guess that historically most moral systems do
not depend upon metaphysical proofs of freedom of the will derived from a
priori cognitions by means of pure reason. They depend upon myths that
express and acknowledge the mystery of the fate vs. free will issue, a
mystery I think is expressed very well in _Lawrence of Arabia_. One of
Lawrence's Arab allies argues with him that he is the most free man in the
world--white, male, a British officer, an educated man, a fierce and
successful warrior--but Lawrence demurrs, saying, "Yes, I can do what I
want. But I cannot *want* what I want." He's a man whose assumptions
about himself have been shattered by the war in the desert, he's horrified
by some of what he has discovered, and he no longer knows who he is. He
is free to choose his actions, but not to choose what moves him to action.
I must be a bad philosopher because I don't feel married to any one
explanation of what we call "freedom of the will." For me, at least, the
free will vs. fate question is still a mystery. I find the arguments
(presented on Brin-L in the past by others) for a certain degree of
biological determinism pretty compelling, and my internal sensation of
freedom can be explained fairly well, I think, in terms of the
biological "machine" making a choice. On the other hand, I've always been
fond of the radical form of freedom presented by Sartre and Camus, and
I'm not sure the two doctrines are entirely incompatible (because even
that form of freedom is constrained by circumstances).
I'm also inclined to agree with you, Dan, that future brain states may
well be unpredictable due to the consequences of QM, leaving the door open
for freedom of the will. On the other hand, if the physical brain is the
source of all consciousness, then we have good reason to believe that the
things among which we choose, and the feelings that drive our decisions,
may be largely predetermined in a preconscious physical process that we
cannot really control. Being conscious of the act of choosing, we feel
free...but at what point in the brain-mind-will process did that choice
really get made? I'm not sure that's an answer that can be had from
introspection alone...but who knows, maybe the Dalai Lama would disagree.
<bg>
Generally speaking, the arguments about freedom of the will that I see in
metaphysics that are involved with Christianity in some way always leave
me cold because they're rarely just about freedom of the will: they are
about sin and good and evil and the idea of absolute moral standards and
human dignity and so on. Too many philosophers seem to start with the
assumption that unless we prove free will, the rest of the Christian myth
will crumble, therefore our concept of the free will *must* be true, even
if we are obliged to reason as though we don't at the start believe that
to be the case.
These associations don't neccesarily invalidate a given argument, but I
find all such arguments inherently suspect because they mix philosophy and
theology. They seem to whisper,"Please overlook my flaws because you
know you want what I've got to offer."
> But, turn it around. If we have absolutely no control over our actions,
> what dignity is there in being humans. We are just along for the ride.
What an interesting use of the word. "Dignity" is something that
adheres to people of high social status who refuse to stoop to indulge in
the habits and practices of those without status. By extension people
without status who nevertheless have the bearing of those with status are
sometimes said to be dignified. For the sake of egalitarianism we also
ascribe dignity to those who maintain their individuality and resolve in
the face of adverse circustances regardless of status.
When we associate dignity with free will, i.e. with the mere fact of being
human, it loses much of its meaning except insofar as it implies that
humans somehow enjoy a relationship of superior bearing towards the
universe at large which mirrors the relationship between dignified people
and undigified people.
In other words, "dignity" used in this way means, "Please God don't let us
turn out to be nothing but animals." Compare this to, "Darling, I'd be
devestated if our Johnny had to go to a state university instead of
Harvard. It's so undignified!" and you'll see what I mean.
The dignity with which we invest the human condition (freedom) is
something built up elaborately with myth and metaphysics and dogma over
centuries. But it isn't an argument.
Imagine that we have free will, or a form of it--this strikes me as being
well within the realm of scientific possibility. But also imagine that
our free will were demonstrated scientifically, using known physics and
maybe future laws of mesophysics yet to be formulated. We *know* we are
free.
What then? Does that prove there's a God who loves us? Who cares whether
we're good or bad? No. As free people will we by default exhibit the
virtues of the dignified? No. Does freedom, by itself, confer dignity?
No. It allows us to face suffering bravely, perhaps, but freedom makes
suffering (in the manner that might compromise dignity) possible in the
first place, so it's a bit of a wash. If freedom doesn't exist, then
dignity is simply a property of subsets of social systems; if freedom does
exists, than dignity is far from given.
> What will be will be is the only reasonable philosophy. There's no
> sense worrying about anything, because there's
> nothing that we can do except do what we are forced to do.
Again, this only makes sense if we assume that possibilities are binary
opposites: totally free or enslaved by biology and physics. Since we
already know that we aren't omniscient or omnipotent, totaly freedom
really isn't on the table anyway. Regardless of how our brains work, our
choices are severely limited by our experiences at the very least. If we
look at humanity dispassionately, we'll see that people tend to do the
same things, good and bad, to themselves and each other over and over
again. Despite our progress and in spite of knowing better, we continue
to do the same stupid, cruel, greedy things, and we continue to indulge in
senseless acts of kindness and beauty as well; but we seem to do these
things for the same reasons as always.
Besides, even if we conclude that fate is predestined, we can't help
behaving as though we have choices because we do have them to make,
regardless of whether we have much control over how we make them. And
hey, maybe it makes sense to adopt a no-worries (that is, no worries about
sin or hell or the rapture or what the neighbors think) attitude. We
do worry about a lot of silly crap, after all. Our serious decisions will
still be informed by concern for the consequences because that's how we've
evolved to operate.
A friend of mine is fond of attaching to his emails the following
statement: "We are fools if we dance and fools if we don't dance, so we
might as well dance."
Marvin Long
Austin, Texas
Don't be frightened. Adrenaline will just make your blood taste funny.
