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Essays, Opinion, & Commentary |
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TABLE OF CONTENTS Objections Against Freedom of Will
Objections Against Freedom of the Will Our modern era has become so impressed with the progress made by the physical sciences that it is hardly capable of interpreting anything except in physical and mechanical concepts. The spiritual and immaterial is alien to the minds of many modern philosophers and psychologists. In consequence of their materialistic, mechanistic training, the freedom of the will is something "unintelligible" and "inconceivable." Causes, as they come to know them in physical nature, act necessarily, and so it happens that the concept of "cause" is synonymous in their reasoning with "necessarily acting cause." The will as a "freely acting cause" is to them a contradiction in terms; they see no place for it in a mechanically operating universe. The facts in favor of the freedom of the will are very clear, so far as everyday experience goes; they cannot very well be denied by these determinists. Yet the freedom of the will is diametrically opposed to the theoretical assumptions of their materialistic, mechanical system of philosophy. Loath to admit the error of these assumptions and of their philosophic convictions, they have advanced many objections against the freedom of the will. The point of the attack varies considerably. Some objections are psychological in nature, some are metaphysical, and some are based on the physical, physiological, and sociological sciences. While many of the arguments against free will are specious and amount to nothing more than sheer quibbling, some of them deserve serious consideration. The more important objections will now be stated and answered. Unconsciousness of Freedom John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), the famous Utilitarian philosopher, voices an objection against the freedom of the will on psychological grounds. He contends that we cannot be conscious of this freedom. To be conscious that we are free in our volition, it would be required, before we act, that we be conscious of the fact that we could really act otherwise than we do. Consciousness, however, Mill claims, merely tells us what we actually do or feel; it never tells us what we are capable of doing. In other words, we are conscious of the act of willing, but not of the power of willing; hence, it is impossible to know whether the power is free or determined. We admit that the power of the will as such is not an object of direct consciousness. Mill, however, failed to note that every act of volition involves the actuation of the power of the will, the developmental process of the volitional act itself. In the developmental process of many volitional acts, I am conscious that they are elicited by motives, but the motives do not determine and necessitate the acts; I myself determine the acts. I clearly perceive that I have here a motive plus something else which makes the impulse of the motive effective; the act of the will is thus eventually determined, not by the motive, but by the will itself. An analysis of the act of volition shows that two factors are required: an impulse flowing from a motive which elicits, but does not compel, me to act; and a positive consent of my will, supplementing the deficiency of the objective motive. At times, therefore, I observe that I consent to the impulse originating from the motive, and at other times I observe that I withhold my consent to the impulse originating from the motive; whether the act of volition is set or not set, thus depends on the active interposition of my Ego and not merely on the presentation of the motive. So long as the process of volition is protracted and not completed, the final decision to act or not to act, to act this way or that way, rests in my power of determination. The will, therefore, is the master of its own determinations; and as such it is free, because the consent, as I know from my internal experience, is a freely exercised act of the will. Experiments in scientific psychology have revealed the Ego-in-Action in every deliberate decision. Illusion Determinists frequently assert that our conviction of the freedom of the will is but an illusion based upon an ignorance of the causes which produce the acts of the will. Since we are not conscious of the underlying causes which determine the will to act, we have the feeling of freedom in our acts; in reality, however, all acts of the will are determined. In answer to this objection, we assert, first of all, than an appeal to ignorance is the worst sort of argument anyone can advance. Determinists labor under this ignorance as well as the libertarians, those that assert the freedom of the will. The determinists have no more right to suppose that the unknown causes of our voluntary acts are necessary in their operation than that they are free; we simply could not know whether the will is free or determined under any circumstances. Secondly, this assertion of the determinists contradicts the experience of consciousness, and consciousness is the ultimate source of knowledge in this matter. Our experience tells us that the ignorance of the cause of actions occurring within us does not necessarily induce in us the conviction that this cause is free. On the contrary, when we act on a momentary impulse and without reflection, not knowing why we act, then we are convinced that our act was involuntary, unfree, and irresponsible. On the other hand, when we reflect upon a project with careful deliberation, consider all its advantages and disadvantages, investigate the various means at our disposal, lay out a plan in all its details, weight all the motives for and against a course of action -- in a word, when our knowledge is at its best -- then it is that the conviction of the freedom of the will and of its choice is greatest. It is, therefore, the incontrovertible testimony of our consciousness that our conviction of freedom is not based on the illusion of ignorance but on the certainty of knowledge. It is true, of course, that subconscious motives often influence the will. A mental act or attitude frequently brings about the performance of an external act contrary to our resolutions. If we bear in mind, however, the conditions required for the free exercise of the will, as stated previously, it will readily be observed that one or the other of these conditions has not been verified. No supporter of the freedom of the will claims that all acts of the will under all circumstances are free, but borderline cases do not invalidate the instances where the requisite conditions are clearly perceived by consciousness to have been verified for the free exercise of the will. While many cases will always remain doubtful, many cases of the free exercise of the will must be allowed by an unbiased observer. It is the verdict of our consciousness that the will is free in many of its acts. This verdict must be accepted as true; otherwise the truth-value of our consciousness is destroyed, and Skepticism is the inevitable result. The Strongest Motive It is a stock argument of determinists that the strongest motive always does and always must prevail, so that the will is intrinsically determined to yield to the strongest motive; the will, therefore, is not free in its choice. The objection is invalid. Since the will is an appetency and as such can strive only for what is perceived to be good, it is obvious that the motives draw the will in proportion to the amount of value they contain. Slight values influence the will slightly, great values influence it greatly. It is but natural, therefore, that the will, under ordinary and normal circumstances, should and does strive fro the greatest value contained in the proposed motives. It would indeed be most unusual, if this were not the case. The arguments of the opponents, however, to be valid, must prove that man, under all conditions, is necessitated to choose what is intellectually apprehended as possessing the greatest objective attractiveness for the will. It will not do to assert, as the British philosopher Alexander Bain apparently asserts (in his book Mental Science), that the strongest motive is the one which actually prevails. He is guilty of a begging of the question. Certainly, the motive which is willed is the one which prevails, and in a sense this motive is the strongest. This only means that the motive which prevails actually prevails, but does not settle the question whether the will is determined or free in making a particular motive prevail. The only legitimate meaning which can be attached to the statement that "the strongest motive always prevails and must prevail" is the deterministic meaning that the objectively strongest motive must prevail; the will must necessarily follow the motive containing, among other motives present, the more preferable good considered by the intellect as such. John Stuart Mill interprets the "strongest" motive as the one which is most pleasurable, because that is the more preferable good. He contends that the will is constrained to accept this motive and yield to it. We claim that personal experience disproves this contention. It is not true that we always choose the course of action which is most pleasurable. Every decent person not infrequently resists temptations, recognized to be the most pleasurable, for the sake of an ideal or from a sense of duty, conscious of the fact that yielding to the temptation would be easy and offering resistance to it most difficult. Soldiers and martyrs prefer death to the violation of their duty, even when excruciating agony accompanies the performance of their duty. To uphold and ideal and to fulfill one's duty under such conditions is indeed the stronger motive, but only because the will makes it so; it is not more pleasurable in itself. Most determinists interpret the "strongest" motive as the one which, among others present before the mind, represents the greatest good or value, without specifying whether or not it be the most pleasurable; such an object or experience, presented as a motive, is the more preferable and as such forces the will into acceptance. The point at issue is this: Is the will compelled to choose the motive which the intellect proposes to it as possessing the greatest value or attractiveness among conflicting motives, so that this particular motive has objective preference, considered independently of any action of the will? Or, on the contrary, can the will (the Ego) confer subjective preference on any of the motives presented, irrespective of their objective merits, thereby making an objectively weaker motive the strongest? In the former alternative the objectively "strongest" motive prevails under all conditions, and the will is determined in its volition; in the second alternative the will itself determines which motive shall prevail, and it cannot be said to be determined in its volition by the (objectively) "strongest" motive. Of course, the will in choosing always prefers one motive to another and thereby shows that this one pleases it more than the others; but does this preference of the will correspond to the preceding judgment of the intellect as to preferableness? If man can act in opposition to this judgment of the intellect and can prefer the weaker motive, then he determines himself and is independent of the strength or weakness of the motives proposed by the intellect. Herein lies the crux of the problem of free will. Ordinarily, the will accepts the side proposed as the better or best; but not always. If it were really true that the will always and necessarily prefers that which the intellect perceives to be better or best, how then can it happen that we frequently deplore after our decision that we have "acted against our better judgment," that we have "acted foolishly," having carelessly or obstinately disregarded what we knew to be the better or best course of action? In many instances we act contrary to our own interests, simply because we so desire, knowing full well that we are harming ourselves by acting according to the whim of our will rather than according to the objective merits of the motives as recognized by the intellect. It is not the objectively strongest motive which prevails against the will and determines it to act; it is the act of the will which determines which motive shall be strongest and shall actually prevail. Influence of Character Some determinists, among them Schopenhauer, Wundt, Sidgwick, and others, impugn the freedom of the will on the grounds that every act of man is determined by his character and by the motives which influence the will at any particular moment. Oddly enough, some of these philosophers and psychologists are reluctant to discard the concept of man's responsibility for his actions; they attempt to reconcile responsibility and the determinacy of character by pointing out that "character" is to a very great extent the result of man's own actions and habits. Character, we admit, undoubtedly exerts a great influence on the decisions of our will. Knowing the character of a person often enables us to predict with probability how such a person will act in a given set of circumstances. However, we are not determined entirely in our will acts by the inherited and acquired dispositions of character. Here again we must appeal to personal experience. We are conscious of the weakness and faultiness of character, of the pressure of long-standing acquired habits, of the frequency of yielding to urgent passions; but we are also conscious that we can, though no doubt with difficulty, resist the impulses which storm the citadel of the will. Many a drunkard and drug addict has succeeded, perhaps after frequent relapses, in conquering his reigning passion by a persistent struggle of his will. It is futile for the opponents to speak of "responsibility" by stating that a person's characters is the result of his own actions and habits. If the will is not free but determined, then all the actions and habits which contribute to the formation of character are also determined. Man cannot be held responsible for something he is incapable of doing or avoiding. Responsibility presupposes the freedom of the will. The Principle of Causality Many determinists find the freedom of the will "inconceivable" and "unintelligible" because, in their opinion, a free act of the will would be an effect without a cause. They contend that a free act would violate the Principle of Causality. In answer to this argument, we deny emphatically the supposition that an act of the will, merely because it is a free act, is an effect without a cause. The Principle of Causality is a metaphysical principle, and it is immediately evident. It states that where there is an effect there must of necessity be a cause which produces this effect; that is to say, everything which receives being and existence must receive this being and existence from something or somebody, because a nonexistent being cannot give being and existence to itself. We admit the validity of the Principle of Causality in the case of the free act of the will as an effect. A double cause is active in its production; a moral cause, namely, the motive; and an efficient cause, namely, the Ego using the will as power. Hence, the opponents are wrong when they assert that a free act of the will violates the Principle of Causality. The Principle of Causality demands that every effect must necessarily have a cause; but whether this cause acts in a free or in a determined manner, lies outside the purview of the principle. So long as there is an efficient cause for the effect produced, the principle is satisfied. In order that their objection be valid, determinists would have to prove that the Principle of Causality demands that every effect must be produced by a necessary and not by a free cause. They arbitrarily change the meaning of the axiom that "Every effect must necessarily have a cause" into the axiom that "Every effect must have a necessarily acting cause." The latter axiom, however, involves an unwarranted assumption which amounts to a begging of the question, because the postulate of a necessarily acting cause is the very point at issue. Physiological Determinism Materialistic philosophers and psychologists reduce all mental events, including volition, to the level of physiological and neurological processes. The older materialists, such as Moleschott, Buchner, Haeckel, and others, held the crass view that all psychical processes are nothing more than glandular in character. The more refined modern materialists identify volition with cerebral functions, motor impulses, or kinesthetic sensations of some sort. Representatives of this general view are E.B. Titchener, John Watson, and many modern psychologists. There is obviously no place in such doctrines for a will capable of free acts. Physiological and neurological processes play an important part in man's mental life, because the operations of the senses furnish the materials from which the intellect abstracts its ideas. Any serious disturbance of the physiological and neurological processes is bound to hamper the intellect in its proper functions. Distortions of intellectual judgments, on their part, influence the will adversely, because the will is dependent on the intellect for the proper presentation of motives. Nevertheless, determinists need more than this dependence of the will on physiological and neurological conditions in order to prove that the will is determined and necessitated by these conditions in its acts. They must prove that it is an intrinsic dependence; only then would the will be determined. An extrinsic dependence of the will on these conditions would leave the inner nature of the will intact and free. The facts we have adduced are proof that the will can and does determine itself. At any rate, the burden of proof rests on the shoulders of our opponents, and they fail to prove that the will is "intrinsically" dependent on physiological and neurological conditions. The will is to the human organism what the pilot is to a ship. The ship does not control the pilot; the pilot controls the ship. He directs the course of the ship by means of the steering gear. If the steering gear is defective, the pilot has difficulty in keeping a proper course; and if the steering gear breaks down completely, his control of the ship is lost. The pilot's dependence on the steering gear is very real, yet it does not determine the pilot's decisions. Under normal conditions the ship obeys the pilot's directions and follows the course he decrees. Similarly, the organism normally obeys the commands of the free will; but when serious disorders hamper or destroy the proper functioning of the organism, the will, notwithstanding its intrinsic freedom of action, suffers from the refractory medium through which it must control the organism. Just how the will controls the organism, so far as it can do so at all, is a mystery. Every vital action is at bottom a profoundly mysterious reality which no scientific experiment or analysis is able to explain completely. A thousand difficulties, however, cannot disprove a fact. And it is a fact, as we have seen, that the human will is a power which determines itself to act or not to act, to act this way or that way, as it desires. It is free in its decisions, no matter whether or not we understand fully how the will operates. The Conservation of Energy Determinists also raise the objection that the freedom of the will would nullify the Principle of the Conservation of Energy. The principle states that the sum-total of energy in a closed system, such as the universe, is always constant. They argue that the will, in causing bodily movements, introduces new energy into the organism, thereby increasing the sum-total of energy in the universe and overthrowing the principle mentioned. Now, the Principle of the Conservation of Energy is an empirical law, the result of a partial scientific induction, generalized and applied to the universe at large. As applied to the universe, the principle is incapable of proof, because no one can measure the energy of the universe. it may not be true, as scientists generally admit. In fact, present-day physicists defend the view that energy can be converted into mass and mass into energy. Hence, even if the action of the will did actually increase the sum-total of energy by a small amount, that would be no reason to deny the free action of the will. It does not seem necessary to admit that the will, in causing bodily movements, introduces any new energy into the organism. For the action of the will can be explained as follows: The will is not an efficient cause producing mechanical effects. All that the will does is to direct the power of local movement possessed by the organism to some action. This effect does not require the expenditure of any active force, for the action of will is not transitive, having an external effect, but is immanent. All the energy that is put forth externally comes from the sensitive appetite and the locomotive faculty, which are material faculties subject to the law of the conservation of energy. Moral Statistics Determinists frequently quote moral statistics as a proof against the freedom of the will. If the acts of the will are really free, they argue, there should be no uniformity in human actions. Yet the records show that the number of marriages, illegitimate births, murders, burglaries, divorces, suicides, etc., vary but little in a country year after year. From these statistics they draw the conclusion that moral acts, which are supposedly free, are subject to laws and must be determined in their very nature. We deny the validity of the argument. All men possess a similar nature. They are presumably influenced by the same general factors of natural inclinations, heredity, environment, education, and so forth. It is but natural, therefore, that human beings of a certain social level will act in a somewhat uniform manner. To a very great extent, the lives of men are governed by routine and habit, not by serious deliberation and decision. The impulses of self-preservation, of propagation, of parental and filial attachment, of love and hate, of greed and self-interest, are strong and urgent and universal; and men, as a general rule, are more inclined to yield to these influences than to resist. The regularity of these influences explains the regularity of human behavior. It must be remembered, however, that this regularity is a regularity of averages. It is possible to predict the average number of events which will occur, but it is impossible to predict which individuals will be responsible for the events. Therein lies the difference between a moral law and a physical law. Given all the conditioning antecedents in a specific instance in physical nature, we can predict the effect with absolute certainty, because such an effect is determined by physical law. In the case of a human being, however, we can predict his action only with moral probability, because he is not forced by the conditioning antecedents to act in a definite manner; he probably will act as expected, but he may, being free, act otherwise. The will exists, and it is free. The objections raised against the freedom of the will fail to prove the determinacy of volitional acts. |
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