What about Free Will?

by heathervescent

There's a fascinating article in the Economist on science's first look into free will. The concept of free will is that you have a choice - and responsibility for your actions based on your choice. But if you don't have choice, something that happened to you outside of your responsibility, do you have free will or are you merely stimulus-response acting? This is exactly the question brought up in the article, which tells the following fascinating story.

IN THE late 1990s a previously blameless American began collecting child pornography and propositioning children. On the day before he was due to be sentenced to prison for his crimes, he had his brain scanned. He had a tumour. When it had been removed, his paedophilic [sic] tendencies went away. When it started growing back, they returned. When the regrowth was removed, they vanished again. Who then was the child abuser?

It's an interesting question, especially with the previous story in mind. But take a walk through your neighborhood grocery store. Yes, you have the choice to choose the items you want to buy; however advertising and marketing and brand image program you to react and respond in certain ways to certain products. This is similar

Markets also depend on the idea that personal choice is free choice. Mostly, that is not a problem. Even if choice is guided by unconscious instinct, that instinct will usually have been honed by natural selection to do the right thing. But not always. Fatty, sugary foods subvert evolved instincts, as do addictive drugs such as nicotine, alcohol and cocaine. Pornography does as well. Liberals say that individuals should be free to consume these, or not. Erode free will, and you erode that argument.

The bottom line to me, is not whether we have or exercise free will - it's that we take responsibility for our actions. Because is it really free will, if we've been programmed to act certain ways when stimulated with specific items?

Read the full article here.

| 12/30/06 | News