Some observations on the “free will” wars

by Ian Pollock

hustletronix.com/wordpress



It has been interesting to view the exchanges on free will (more neutrally, volition) between Massimo, Jerry Coyne, and the readers of both blogs. I felt like chiming in when I read this in Massimo’s latest sortie:


“...And there are very decent philosophical arguments against determinism (and reductionism, which is also implied by this sort of claim)”

This fits in with my impression that many see incompatibilist determinism a la Jerry Coyne as either “reductionism gone mad,” or, putting a positive spin on it, the logical consequence of reductionism applied to human brains.

I confess myself perplexed by this, because it seems to me that the intuitions driving incompatibilism stem from absent or insufficiently applied reductionism. Let me try to explain.

Let’s start with Jerry’s “practical test” of free will:

If you were put in the same position twice — if the tape of your life could be rewound to the exact moment when you made a decision, with every circumstance leading up to that moment the same and all the molecules in the universe aligned in the same way — you could have chosen differently.

To see the problem with this test, suppose we are interested in a different question: whether Alice loves Bob. I propose as a practical test of this proposition: “What you need to do is take a look at Alice’s brain and see if areas associated with Bob display amorous patterns of neural firing.”

The obvious main problem with my “practical test” of love is that although it’s couched in sciencey language, the entire question of whether Alice loves Bob has been transfered to the word “amorous,” which has still not been reduced to something well-defined and testable. Explanatorily, we are no better off than we were before. Of course, the mistake in my test is trivially easy to see, but the mistake in Jerry’s test of free will is almost as obvious. “Choice” and “free will” and “volition” are damn near synonyms, so although a dictionary may reference “choice” in its definition of “free will,” a scientific test should never do such a thing. Likewise, "could" is a concept at the very heart of the matter! Jerry’s test of free will — “you could have chosen differently” — is not nearly reductionist enough.*

So how would I tackle the issue of free will/volition?

Suppose I am driving along an undivided highway when the stray thought comes into my head that I could steer into the opposing lane, resulting in a horrible, deadly accident.

Of course, I don’t do so, because... well, I like living and I don’t much want to kill others, either. And I just washed my car. But I could have done it....

Wait, was I right to say that I could have done it?

Yes and no. As we have seen, the pivotal word in that sentence is “could,” and “could” has at least two meanings that are relevant to the question of free will.

Meaning #1 maps physical possibility, and in this case returns the clear answer “No, the physical state of the universe was such that you could not have steered into oncoming traffic, as evidenced by the fact that you did not, in fact, do so. QED.” Jerry sees this clearly, and I have absolutely no argument with him.

Meaning #2 of “could” maps counterfactual statements. To say that you “could” have done something in this sense is (roughly) to say that IF circumstances had been otherwise, a different outcome would have resulted. Meaning #2 returns the answer “Yes, you could have steered into oncoming traffic, if you had wanted to.”

Meaning #2 is what people actually mean by “could,” most of the time.

If you’ve been sleeping through this post, pay attention now, because the entire click of compatibilism lies in this realization.

Proposition #1: “No, the state of the universe was such that it was physically impossible for you to have steered into oncoming traffic.”

Proposition #2: “Yes, you could have steered into oncoming traffic (if you had wanted to).”

These two propositions are both true in my example. THAT is the essence of compatibilism.

Also note the very important fact that “wanting to” corresponds to a different physical state than “not wanting to.”

These propositions look incompatible because people (especially incompatibilists!) have an annoying tendency to forget about the implicit counterfactual “if” clause in proposition #2.**

Now we are in a position to see that incompatibilism is basically a huge equivocation fallacy. The incompatibilists prove Proposition #1, then assume that therefore, Proposition #2 is proven false. But this does not follow.

Sadly, those who wish to defend free will/volition seem tempted to deny Proposition #1, often by arguing against determinism and reductionism in very implausible ways. I think this is crazy, but I am not going to argue with them here, in the interests of maintaining a coherent stream of thought.

The main point I want to make is that incompatibilist determinists like Jerry are in some sense still in thrall to the dualistic ideas of their culture, although they have explicitly rejected them.

Dan Dennett is fond of repeating this great quote from Lee Siegel, who wrote a book on Indian street magic.

"I'm writing a book on magic," I explain, and I'm asked, "Real magic?" By 'real magic' people mean miracles, thaumaturgical acts, and supernatural powers. "No," I answer: "Conjuring tricks, not real magic." Real magic, in other words, refers to the magic that is not real, while the magic that is real, that can actually be done, is not real magic.

Now consider this passage from Jerry Coyne’s USA Today article:

The ineluctable scientific conclusion is that although we feel that we're characters in the play of our lives, rewriting our parts as we go along, in reality we’re puppets performing scripted parts written by the laws of physics. Most people find that idea intolerable, so powerful is our illusion that we really do make choices. (my emphasis).

But um, Jerry, we do actually make choices, right? Don’t we? I mean, not in some amazingly deep philosophically or morally fraught sense of choice, as in “But did Hitler really have a choice to not be a monster?”, but in a basic, boring, everyday sense, as in “Do you want Froot Loops or muesli?” Surely you talk this way too, when you go home?

I think Jerry would concede that we do make such choices, but insist that they aren’t “real” choices. Well, what is a “real” choice as distinct from an unreal one? Like in the case of magic, it would appear that according to Jerry and other incompatibilists, “real choice” refers to the choices that are not real (i.e., don’t actually happen because they require supernatural powers), while the choice that is real — that can, y’know, actually be done — is not. real. choice.

And yet I would bet a large sum of money that Jerry et al. are perfectly willing to use the language of choice in their daily lives, as soon as they’ve forgotten about the day’s blogo-philosophizing. This is not just because choice is a powerful illusion (which would presumbably be their preferred rationalization) — it’s because the concept of “choice” cuts reality at the joints. Choice is one of the most important things that the human brain does; arguably, the brain’s ability to model the world and choose from alternative actions IS its survival value.

A half-reductionist would look at the concept of choice, experience the usual dualistic intuitions about it, then conclude that since dualism is false, choice must be an illusion. Hence the saying (which I just invented): a little bit of reductionism is a dangerous thing.

A good reductionist would look at this incredibly useful concept of “choice” and then try to figure out how it fits into the determined physical universe. Eventually, they would conclude that choice is a physical process like eating or breathing or thinking. As Gary Drescher says in the perfect expression of this insight:

Choice…is a mechanical process compatible with determinism... The objection "The agent didn’t really make a choice, because the outcome was already predetermined" is as much a non sequitur as the objection "The motor didn’t really exert force, because the outcome was already predetermined."

One final note: I have tried to interpret Jerry’s opinions as faithfully as possible, but I hope he will pardon me and let me know if he feels I have put words into his mouth. In truth so much has been written on this topic recently that it gets hard to keep people's opinions straight!

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* Unlike others, I have absolutely no problem with the fact that Jerry’s test would only be doable in principle, not in practice. Such thought experiments are extremely useful for all sorts of things.

** Of course, the counterfactual “if” can reference lots of different factors besides the desires of the agent. But this example does a nice job of showing that what prevents you from doing X is not necessarily a pernicious outside influence.