Is Free Will an Illusion? Part 2 March 28, 2012
Posted by Matt in Free Will.Tags: free will, intentions, neuroscience, Sam Harris
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Yesterday I introduced the ideas put forth in Sam Harris’s book Free Will, and today I’d like to take a slightly deeper dive into this interesting work. First we answer the question: From where does the Will originate?
Our brains take in untold amounts of information each moment of our lives, yet we are only aware of a very small fraction of it. Everything we come in contact with is recorded, organized, and analyzed in the depths of our minds, and although we notice that our experiences change (thoughts, moods, perceptions, behaviors, etc), we are unaware of the background workings of our brains that produce them.
For instance, I’ve had two cups of coffee this morning. Why did I not choose to forego coffee and instead choose tea or water? Did I consciously choose to have two cups of coffee this morning? Harris says no.
The choice was made for me by events in my brain that I, as the conscious witness of my thoughts and actions, could not inspect or influence. Could I have “changed my mind?” … Yes, but this impulse would also have been the product of unconscious causes. … The intention to do one thing and not another does not originate in the consciousness – rather, it appears in the consciousness, as does any thought or impulse that might oppose it.
Harris then goes on to cite scientific studies to support this idea. Physiologist Benjamin Libet used EEG to show that activity in the brain’s motor cortex can be seen 300 milliseconds before a person feels that they have decided to move. A second study employed fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to further this idea. Experimenters found that associated brain regions contained information a full 7-10 seconds before a conscious decision was made. In other experiments, direct recordings of the cortex showed that the activity of 256 neurons was all that was needed to predict (with 80% accuracy) a person’s decision to move 700 milliseconds before they became aware of it.
Harris carries this hypothesis to its logical conclusion, saying:
These findings are difficult to reconcile with our sense that we are the conscious authors of our actions. One fact now seems indisputable: Some moments before you are aware of what you will do next – a time in which you subjectively appear to have complete freedom to behave however you please – your brain has already determined what you will do. You then become conscious of this “decision” and believe you are in the process of making it.
I cannot decide what I will next think or intend until a thought or intention arises. What will my next mental state be? I do not know – it just happens. Where is the freedom in that?
So, if we do not know what we will intend until the intention arises from our brain, we are not the authors of our thoughts and actions, at least not in the way that we seem to think we are. Thus, in Harris’s view, we are beholden to these neural impulses, based on a combination of collected data and genetics.
To close out this section, he asks and then answers the question, “What would it take to actually have free will?”
You would need to be aware of all factors that determine your thoughts and actions, and you would need complete control over those factors. But there is a paradox here that vitiates the very notion of freedom – for what would influence the influences? More influences? None of these adventitious mental states are the real you. You are not controlling the storm, and you are not lost in it. You are the storm.
Thoughts?
I think it’s telling that the guy who did the research, Benjamin Libet, doesn’t agree with Harris’s conclusion:
“To many philosophers this seemed to indicate that “free will” might not exist in humans at all, but Dr. Libet disagreed. When his experiments showed that if his subjects were told not to move a finger, or to stop moving it, their conscious will would maintain complete control – “could veto it and block performance of the act,” as he described it.”
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/08/18/BANFRK1TG.DTL
I think Libet is right that the ability to stop an action from occuring, apparently consciously, is strong evidence against Harris’s ideas. If I were to punch someone in the face, their first instinct would probably be to hit me back. But something can seemingly override that and stop it from occurring even if they already have their fist cocked. So what was it? Did the brain fire two contradicting commands within 300ms of each other? That doesn’t seem likely if it’s caused by the cause and effect of brain chemistry. Did the brain fire off one command to pretend to punch and the person’s consciousness just perceived it as a change of mind? Maybe, I guess, but that doesn’t seem to be a very useful impulse to danger. Or did the person’s conscious will override the impulse to hit and stay his hand? That seems the most reasonable to me, it fits the evidence of Libet’s experiment, and it seems to better fit collective human experience.
Thanks for that, Jeff. I hadn’t looked that up about Dr. Libet.
Who cares what Libet thinks about the data? He found the correlation – he did not invent the brain.
For that matter Libet’s “consciousness” is not incompatible with Harris’ conclusion, as is just another part of the machinery.
For THAT Matter, the data is only “compatible” with Harris’ conclusion but does not necessitate the belief that our Ego, our experience of “consciousness,” does not control our movements. As far as my brain containing data 7 to 10 seconds before I decide – well, nobody’s disputing that my conscious decisions are made based on a large amount of unconscious data, are they?
Well Sam’s ultimate conclusion of course is that that unconscious data has control over ME. I am not free unless I consciously control my heart rate and perspiration and hormone levels. Because parts of my brain shut down when I’m angry (a wonder he did not share this interesting research) I cannot possibly have free will once I get angry – and my actions during those times can have such an impact on my long-term trajectory.
Its not that I believe in a “soul” or Free Will in any traditional Western “meta”physical self. (Although I prefer the term subphysical). I just find Sam’s understanding of freedom to be a little narrow. (Of course I still wouldn’t support punishment as justice, because that’s just expensive and pointless)
He talks elsewhere of political liberty. Supposing I am a crewman taken captive by Somali pirates. I lose my political liberty undoubtedly, but as a free thinking entity I retain my free will. I choose to struggle or not struggle against my chains, and so forth. Suppose I am crippled in the encounter, and mostly paralyzed but plenty conscious for the rest of my life. Is this debilitation an encroachment on my political liberty, or does it become biological?
At what point do we draw the line between political and biological agents? The captive later suffering PTSD has his thoughts irrevocably altered by that Somali pirate. In controlling all the factors that influence my thoughts and actions – do I have to control you in order to have free will?
The very pragmatic questions about our justice system do not depend on metaphysical understanding – because you can believe in free will and differ nonetheless on the subject. Ultimately it comes down to definition of freedom. Sam becomes a little Platonic here, as he operates from the assumption that FREE WILL is an a priori defined thing that can be proven to exist or not. Ultimately they are of course words which we apply to many situations.
I am as free as I choose to be. I can acknowledge my physical limitations, be they over my heart rate, my limbs, or my surroundings – and I can choose to make what decisions ARE within my grasp.
Sam arrives at the same conclusion – we are the whole “storm”. And wherever you cease defining that “storm” – whether the storm is a part of my body (containing consciousness), or my living body, or my body and tattoo and hair, and sometimes clothes, and sometimes bionic implants.. wherever you cease defining that storm you have drawn a line between “outside” and “inside.” and that “inside” always has some amount of self control and will always be impacted by some factor on the “outside”
in furthur reflection i wonder what sam’s ultimate point in the book is. he seems to be trying to engage in some creative destruction by helping people to question their assumptions and examine their ideas of self. this of course is always a noble subject.
however i find it hard to really articulate what he’s saying ISN’T true and i’m not sure if he’s trying to say anything of what IS true besides some apparent biologic facts.
his discussion, although he concludes with some political views, seems to lead me ultimately in the direction that there is no self. i find that intriguing of course but as a pragmatist i’m far more inclined to say “i seem to have this notion of self. i act often as a self. what IS a self, and what are it’s limitations?”
I’m really curious to hear some thoughts because I love the Reason Project – what is Sam trying to do here?
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Dear Matt:
I think that you really have to look at Benjamin Libet’s experiment is full – not merely Libet’s conclusions.
Saying that, I will point out some of deceit or seriously flawed thinking that Harris is presenting you with.
On the subject of whether having to have tea or coffee, his argument suffers as a circular argument. If he has coffee, his brain must have chosen that ahead of time. But if he has tea, his brain must have that instead. Then he presents these unsubstantiated conclusions as an artifact of proof.
He does throughout his book.
However, let’s get back to Libet.
Harris says… (and actually, I have read this in the studies (although I don’t think it was Libet himself (but those following).
Experimenters found that associated brain regions contained information a full 7-10 seconds before a conscious decision was made.
Now think about this. Though I am Canadian, I like the cut and thrust wit of the Brits where they can peel off retorts at a furious pace. Within 5- 10 seconds you have probably got 3 or 4 quips back and forth. Now if my quip occurred was actually decided upon in the brain 7 – 10 seconds before I made it, and say 5 seconds before I heard what I was quipping against, it would be saying that my brain knew what my interlocutor was about to say.
So what exactly is this supposed EEG brain activity really constituting? Critical thinking is necessary to navigate through the deceit of these experiments.
The biggest problem with the Libet’s experiment lies not so much in the methodology or in jumping to conclusions what the activity actually is. Much comment in the neuroscience community has been made on this subject. What I find missing is investigating what Libet’s and Harris’s conceptual definition of Free Will. I don’t have my Libet notes handy – so I will quote from Harris’ book (which transcribes Libet’s perception fairly accurately.
“Seeming acts of volition merely arise spontaneously (whether caused, uncaused, or probabilistically inclined, it makes no difference) and cannot be traced to a point of origin in our conscious minds. A moment or two of serious self-scrutiny, and you might observe that you no more decide the next thought you think than the next though I write.”
The methodology of the experiment(s) exactly measures this. An act of will is methodologically defined as when the thought impulse to press the button comes to mind.
This is an incoming thought. It is not an act of will. To give sensory analogy, it would be saying the words that you hear from your friend’s mouth is your act of speaking.
Libet speaks upon this matter but is confused. He actually says that you don’t have free will but you have free won’t. In another words, you cannot stop the thought, but he found that his subjects did not have to press the button. They could choose to or not to. His understanding is based on misunderstanding of the conceptual nature of free will. His findings make more sense if you define free will as what you do with that which is incoming (even if it comes from ‘voices’ within), rather than the incoming free will.