| Cougar Press PO Box 894 Meadview AZ 86444 |
| Free Will |
Much is made of the concept of free will. Everyone wants to have it, yet nobody really wants to
accept the responsibility that comes with it.
I should not say "nobody." John Calvin, for instance, toyed with the idea that we each have
free will despite the reality that each of us is predestined to eternal heaven or hell which we will
deserve because, after all, we have free will. This idea was embraced by many, most of whom also
assumed that they were among the ones who were bound for glory.
Modern science has roundly denounced the whole subject. Philosophers are all over the board
with deep discussions about free will versus determinism or mechanism.
The quandary occurs because of what we think we know about cause and effect. One thing
happens, and that causes another thing to happen. For instance, the cue ball is struck by the cue
stick. The combination of direction and force puts the ball into motion. While it may be difficult
for the observer to analyze all of the factors involved in the shot, amount of force, exact angle,
obstructions on the pool table, etc., the general consensus is that the ball will go where the sum of
physical causes directs it. The ball itself, having no brain and especially having no free will,
cannot deviate from this course.
When the ball strikes another ball, the chain of cause and effect is repeated. The motion of the
first ball, which was the effect of the impact of the cue stick, now becomes the cause of the second
ball's direction and velocity.
All of nature, all of creation, all of reality is an endless chain of cause and effect. Where can free
will fit into this mechanism?
Determinism suffered a mild jolt with the theories of Werner Heisenberg. Within the field of
quantum physics, the motion and positions of sub-atomic particles, Heisenberg came up with the
principle of indeterminacy. The basic idea is that we cannot determine both the position and the
velocity of, for instance, an electron.
Responses to this speculation have also been scattered widely. Some philosophers jumped on
the idea as a repudiation of the concept of determinism. The contrary opinion is that just because
we, the human observers, cannot determine exactly where the little particle is and where it's
headed does not mean that the motion is random. It just means that we cannot perceive it
accurately enough to predict.
I do not pretend to be a quantum physicist. When I think about something like free will, I
consider the things that I know about.
For instance, let's say that I do have free will. Does that mean that with a wave of my hand I
can make the mountain leap up and dive into the lake? Obviously not, but why not? What if I
were to go over to that mountain and pick it up and cast it into the water?
Nope. I can't do that either. Why not, if I have free will?
Well, what I can do is go over to the mountain with a big backhoe and a skip loader and
perhaps some dynamite, a bulldozer and a dump truck and, over the course of however long it
takes, I can move that mountain. I can dig it up and dump it into the lake.
So, I can do whatever I will if... and this is the big if... if I follow the laws of physics. Using
heavy machinery and diesel fuel and time, I can move mountains.
Francis Bacon said, "We cannot command nature except by obeying her." He would have
understood the challenge to move mountains. But what about at a more personal level?
There are a whole lot of things that I cannot do with my body, free will or no, things that anyone
can understand. I cannot fly, not without an airplane, a glider, a jet or a rocket. I can hurl
myself from a cliff or a tall building and pretend that I am flying for awhile.
People usually consider the question of free will within the context of what we are able to do. We
can do what we can do.
For instance, I can choose to walk to the store. Is that my free will in action? Or is it the net
effect of all of the sensory inputs, emotional considerations and neural functions that add up to
the effect that I walk to the store?
Digging a little deeper, suppose that I have reached the point where my brain is sending the
message through my nerves to my muscles to get up and head on down to the market. Can I, at
that point, choose not to go? With new sensory inputs its easy to say yes. The phone rings as I
am about to close the door. The brain and the emotions decide that it's more important to find
out who is calling. Or the decision can be to let the answering machine take it, but either way it's
a new sum of all the perceptions, feelings, thoughts and emotions. That's what the brain does.
Here in the age of computers and robots we can observe machines that make decisions based on
various data. We know that robots have no free will. Don't we? At least we can see that the
ability to make decisions is not the same as free will.
Suppose for a moment that I have free will. We have already seen that the exercise of that gift is
constrained by physical reality. However, there is another range of constraints, and that is the
will of others.
Imagine that I do want to walk down to the store, but that my neighbor is determined to prevent
me. Both of these actions are in the realm of possibility, yet only one of us can have our way. So
it seems that free will is also restricted by the will of others. We are at liberty to do as we wish, so
long as someone else does not prevent that wish. A prisoner in a cell can go anywhere he wants,
so long as these destinations are confined to his cell and his imagination.
Now, let's take a big step back and look at the whole universe for a moment. Our imaginations
allow us to do that. And, let us assume that there is a God. God has free will, almost by
definition. One of the arguments for the existence of only one God is that, if there were more
than one, one of them could not have free will. At some point the two wills would collide, and
one would prevail. This is much the same as the opposition of two human wills.
However, a more fierce conflict is when I, a mere human, have a will that is counter to the will of
God. Who will win that one?
Theologians and philosophers may say that our Creator has granted us free will. Is this
supposed to mean that the dear Lord relinquished His own free will so that mankind could do
what he wanted? Well, we already have determined that this is not so. As we have discussed, a
human is only free, can only be free, within the constraints of the physical universe. Once again,
hats off to Francis Bacon for his observation about obedience to the laws of nature being the
requirement if we want to exert any control on reality.
So God says, "Let there be gravity." My free will does not countermand this dictum. I can do
whatever I want here on Earth, but up is up and down is down. Fire burns and ice is cold, and
hydrogen is the primary ingredient of the universe.
Here's an idea: if I align my will with the will of the Supreme Being, then and only then will I
achieve total freedom. But, what exactly would that mean?
I am fond of the analogy of a rider on horseback. If you are the rider, but you are seated
backward in the saddle because then you are facing in the direction that you wish to travel, then
good luck. It doesn't work that way. First you must align yourself with the horse, and then you
can think about guiding the horse toward your destination.
Now, God is not a horse; the analogy fails if we carry it too far, but the truth is the same. If you
or I wish to have free will, we need to align our will with the will of God, because if we don't we
are doomed to be carried through life in constant protest.
In her book, Medicine Woman, Lynn V. Andrews has the old lady say that, "When we accept
our own death, we become free." She goes on to say that this acceptance does not in any way
speed up our ultimate doom.
I believe that we do need to accept our own deaths because, once again, to fail to do so is like
being mounted backward on a horse. Death is inevitable. It may come tomorrow. It may come
next year, or it may be fifty years in the future. The point is that if we want to be in charge of our
life, if we want to have free will, we have to freely choose that which is actually going to happen.
To do otherwise is to surrender to delusion.
Although this line of thought may at first seem insufferably ironic, it isn't. I say this because, in
a very real sense we are each already doing the will of God, and we have already made the choice
to end our life with death. Whether we know it or not, we already have free will. Everything that
has happened and that will happen is by our own free choice. To a greater or lesser extent we are
blind to this reality. We are deluded. We think that it is happening to us. We refuse to accept
the responsibility of claiming our fate. Perhaps we have forgotten that we made every choice and
took every step that has brought us to where we are now.
Life becomes wonderful when we make this decision. There is still pain and loss and mystery,
but there is also beauty, and joy, and wisdom and wonder.
accept the responsibility that comes with it.
I should not say "nobody." John Calvin, for instance, toyed with the idea that we each have
free will despite the reality that each of us is predestined to eternal heaven or hell which we will
deserve because, after all, we have free will. This idea was embraced by many, most of whom also
assumed that they were among the ones who were bound for glory.
Modern science has roundly denounced the whole subject. Philosophers are all over the board
with deep discussions about free will versus determinism or mechanism.
The quandary occurs because of what we think we know about cause and effect. One thing
happens, and that causes another thing to happen. For instance, the cue ball is struck by the cue
stick. The combination of direction and force puts the ball into motion. While it may be difficult
for the observer to analyze all of the factors involved in the shot, amount of force, exact angle,
obstructions on the pool table, etc., the general consensus is that the ball will go where the sum of
physical causes directs it. The ball itself, having no brain and especially having no free will,
cannot deviate from this course.
When the ball strikes another ball, the chain of cause and effect is repeated. The motion of the
first ball, which was the effect of the impact of the cue stick, now becomes the cause of the second
ball's direction and velocity.
All of nature, all of creation, all of reality is an endless chain of cause and effect. Where can free
will fit into this mechanism?
Determinism suffered a mild jolt with the theories of Werner Heisenberg. Within the field of
quantum physics, the motion and positions of sub-atomic particles, Heisenberg came up with the
principle of indeterminacy. The basic idea is that we cannot determine both the position and the
velocity of, for instance, an electron.
Responses to this speculation have also been scattered widely. Some philosophers jumped on
the idea as a repudiation of the concept of determinism. The contrary opinion is that just because
we, the human observers, cannot determine exactly where the little particle is and where it's
headed does not mean that the motion is random. It just means that we cannot perceive it
accurately enough to predict.
I do not pretend to be a quantum physicist. When I think about something like free will, I
consider the things that I know about.
For instance, let's say that I do have free will. Does that mean that with a wave of my hand I
can make the mountain leap up and dive into the lake? Obviously not, but why not? What if I
were to go over to that mountain and pick it up and cast it into the water?
Nope. I can't do that either. Why not, if I have free will?
Well, what I can do is go over to the mountain with a big backhoe and a skip loader and
perhaps some dynamite, a bulldozer and a dump truck and, over the course of however long it
takes, I can move that mountain. I can dig it up and dump it into the lake.
So, I can do whatever I will if... and this is the big if... if I follow the laws of physics. Using
heavy machinery and diesel fuel and time, I can move mountains.
Francis Bacon said, "We cannot command nature except by obeying her." He would have
understood the challenge to move mountains. But what about at a more personal level?
There are a whole lot of things that I cannot do with my body, free will or no, things that anyone
can understand. I cannot fly, not without an airplane, a glider, a jet or a rocket. I can hurl
myself from a cliff or a tall building and pretend that I am flying for awhile.
People usually consider the question of free will within the context of what we are able to do. We
can do what we can do.
For instance, I can choose to walk to the store. Is that my free will in action? Or is it the net
effect of all of the sensory inputs, emotional considerations and neural functions that add up to
the effect that I walk to the store?
Digging a little deeper, suppose that I have reached the point where my brain is sending the
message through my nerves to my muscles to get up and head on down to the market. Can I, at
that point, choose not to go? With new sensory inputs its easy to say yes. The phone rings as I
am about to close the door. The brain and the emotions decide that it's more important to find
out who is calling. Or the decision can be to let the answering machine take it, but either way it's
a new sum of all the perceptions, feelings, thoughts and emotions. That's what the brain does.
Here in the age of computers and robots we can observe machines that make decisions based on
various data. We know that robots have no free will. Don't we? At least we can see that the
ability to make decisions is not the same as free will.
Suppose for a moment that I have free will. We have already seen that the exercise of that gift is
constrained by physical reality. However, there is another range of constraints, and that is the
will of others.
Imagine that I do want to walk down to the store, but that my neighbor is determined to prevent
me. Both of these actions are in the realm of possibility, yet only one of us can have our way. So
it seems that free will is also restricted by the will of others. We are at liberty to do as we wish, so
long as someone else does not prevent that wish. A prisoner in a cell can go anywhere he wants,
so long as these destinations are confined to his cell and his imagination.
Now, let's take a big step back and look at the whole universe for a moment. Our imaginations
allow us to do that. And, let us assume that there is a God. God has free will, almost by
definition. One of the arguments for the existence of only one God is that, if there were more
than one, one of them could not have free will. At some point the two wills would collide, and
one would prevail. This is much the same as the opposition of two human wills.
However, a more fierce conflict is when I, a mere human, have a will that is counter to the will of
God. Who will win that one?
Theologians and philosophers may say that our Creator has granted us free will. Is this
supposed to mean that the dear Lord relinquished His own free will so that mankind could do
what he wanted? Well, we already have determined that this is not so. As we have discussed, a
human is only free, can only be free, within the constraints of the physical universe. Once again,
hats off to Francis Bacon for his observation about obedience to the laws of nature being the
requirement if we want to exert any control on reality.
So God says, "Let there be gravity." My free will does not countermand this dictum. I can do
whatever I want here on Earth, but up is up and down is down. Fire burns and ice is cold, and
hydrogen is the primary ingredient of the universe.
Here's an idea: if I align my will with the will of the Supreme Being, then and only then will I
achieve total freedom. But, what exactly would that mean?
I am fond of the analogy of a rider on horseback. If you are the rider, but you are seated
backward in the saddle because then you are facing in the direction that you wish to travel, then
good luck. It doesn't work that way. First you must align yourself with the horse, and then you
can think about guiding the horse toward your destination.
Now, God is not a horse; the analogy fails if we carry it too far, but the truth is the same. If you
or I wish to have free will, we need to align our will with the will of God, because if we don't we
are doomed to be carried through life in constant protest.
In her book, Medicine Woman, Lynn V. Andrews has the old lady say that, "When we accept
our own death, we become free." She goes on to say that this acceptance does not in any way
speed up our ultimate doom.
I believe that we do need to accept our own deaths because, once again, to fail to do so is like
being mounted backward on a horse. Death is inevitable. It may come tomorrow. It may come
next year, or it may be fifty years in the future. The point is that if we want to be in charge of our
life, if we want to have free will, we have to freely choose that which is actually going to happen.
To do otherwise is to surrender to delusion.
Although this line of thought may at first seem insufferably ironic, it isn't. I say this because, in
a very real sense we are each already doing the will of God, and we have already made the choice
to end our life with death. Whether we know it or not, we already have free will. Everything that
has happened and that will happen is by our own free choice. To a greater or lesser extent we are
blind to this reality. We are deluded. We think that it is happening to us. We refuse to accept
the responsibility of claiming our fate. Perhaps we have forgotten that we made every choice and
took every step that has brought us to where we are now.
Life becomes wonderful when we make this decision. There is still pain and loss and mystery,
but there is also beauty, and joy, and wisdom and wonder.
| Yoga for Carnivores by Jay Dyck |