Free Will: Egnor shows neurological proof (Introduction)

by dhw, Thursday, November 12, 2020, 12:21 (1472 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: What we call our will cannot exist without consciousness, and nobody knows the origin of consciousness. Simply stating that it is immaterial does not prove that it is not the PRODUCT of materials, and it certainly doesn’t prove that there is such a thing as the soul. Although in a “specific sense” I can agree with Aquinas’s reasoning (see later), the neuroscience proves absolutely nothing. The case against free will is not confined to materialism versus dualism, but encompasses all the influences that shape our decisions and over which we have no control: to what extent are our reactions to choice determined by our genes, our upbringing, our chemical composition, diseases, accidents, experiences etc.? We may feel that our decisions are our own, because the influences are subconscious, but that feeling is hardly a reason for saying that our decisions are “free”, and it ignores the chain of cause and effect, which led Romansh to define free will out of existence, along the lines of the ability to take decisions independently of the universe. (I can’t remember his exact words.)

DAVID: Egnor's point that brain seizures NEVER produce immaterial thoughts is an answer to your point I now have in green.

It was Penrose who discussed seizures, and I don’t follow the logic. Brain seizures cause loss of control and in many cases loss of consciousness. I don’t find it surprising that someone who has lost control and/or consciousness does not think abstractly or make decisions! Sometimes these patients behave irrationally – as do drunkards – but this would suggest that seizures, like alcohol, change the way in which the brain functions, i.e. the state of the brain determines the mode of behaviour. Why would an immaterial, abstractly thinking, decision-making soul be affected?

DAVID: We develop our identity as a sum of all factors you list. But our identity is finally a self-construct of ego defense mechanisms, ambitions and purposes, influenced by all those factors you list but not bound by them, so basically free of them.

That is the big question. Do you regard free will as meaning free from all the influences I have listed that have made you what you are? I don’t see how that is possible. Or do you mean that your decisions are yours and yours alone, free from constraints imposed on you by sources other than the situation and your own limitations? If so, then I agree with you and Aquinas that we do have free will.

DAVID: As usual you draw a line in the sand and stand on both sides of it. My immaterial decisions may have to use the brain to create them, but the arise in my immaterial soul /consciousness under my sole control. They may be influenced by past learned concepts which are also immaterial.

They can also be influenced by past events which are material! Poverty, violence, physical disability, accidents, rape…And part of our identity is already formed by our genes!

DAVID: The only point I can give you is the circumstance of decision making under severe arousal with an adrenalin/serotonin/dopamine rush from extreme excitement, fear, joy or sadness which bathe and influence the neurons at work. Emotions should not be used in decision making as I have always cautioned my children when they were young.

I don’t know what point you are trying to make. You are now emphasizing the influence that our chemicals can have on our decisions. How free are we to control our emotions – and what determines our degree of control? As for your advice to your children, I have no doubt you have been a wonderful father, as I have the greatest respect for your deeply humanitarian ideals and concern for the welfare of others. (Anyone who reads these posts will presume that we are deadly enemies, but we have been friends for many years!) However, there are times when emotions are considerably better guides than reason! As a white European, I fell in love with a black African girl some sixty years ago, at a time when mixed marriages were taboo and I was fully aware of the problems we would face. But the emotion of love has its own reasons. Marrying her was the best decision I ever made. I reckon my children would agree.