Consciousness

• seCtIon tHRee: BoDY AnD WoRLD
  the public over its non-existence. Many
  of the researchers discussed here fall into
  this category. A large part of the problem,
  he says, is a confusion between determin-
  ism and fatalism. Fatalism is the belief that
  because everything is determined, it is
  pointless to act. But a determinist, Miles
  reminds us, will make as many decisions
  as a believer in free will; the only difference is that the determinist will recognise her
  decisions as fully determined. In a restaurant,

The determinist will still select the fish over the wood pigeon, he or she

just will not cast the runes seeking instruction, offer up a quick prayer for

guidance, or invoke this as proof of either God or free will.

(Miles, 2013, pp. 214–215)

Some take up the challenge of embracing determinism without fatalism when

following a spiritual path: the surrendering of will forms part of the mystical tradi-

tions of both Christianity and Islam, and Buddhist teachings include the concept

of anatta, or no-self, which rejects the idea of any persisting entity that acts, and

encourages a way of non-action or not-doing (Chapter 18). In his classic book The

Way of Zen, Alan Watts describes the consequences.

We just decide without having the faintest understanding of how we do it. In

fact it is neither voluntary nor involuntary. [. . .] a decision – the freest of my

actions – just happens like hiccups inside me or like a bird singing outside me.

(Watts, 1957, p. 141)

This echoes James’s simple ‘we have got up’. To live this way, it must be ‘clear

beyond any shadow of doubt that it is actually impossible to do anything else’,

says Watt (p. 161). This is ‘unmotivated non-volitional functioning’. It is how things

are because really there is no entity to act, no entity to be either bound or free

(Wei Wu Wei, 2004).

Is such complete giving up of free will possible for ordinary mortals? Searle claims

not. ‘We cannot get rid of the conviction that we are free even if we become philo-

sophically convinced that the conviction is wrong’ (2004, p. 219). Interviewing phi-

losophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists about their beliefs, Sue (Blackmore,

2005) found that even those who did not believe in free will often claimed that

to live healthily and happily they had to separate their intellectual understanding

from the rest of their life, and live ‘as if ’ they did believe.

So these fears run deep, but are they valid? The answer from those who have tried

is that the long path to giving up free will leads not to immorality but to kindness,

compassion, and personal happiness.

The thing that doesn’t happen, but of which people are quite reasonably

scared, is that I get worse. A common elaboration of the belief that

control is real [. . .] is that I can, and must control ‘myself ’, and that unless

I do, base urges will spill out and I will run amok.

(Claxton, 1986a, p. 69)

‘when I go to the

restaurant and I look

at the menu, I might

decide “Well, I’ll have

the spaghetti”, but I’m

not forced to have the

spaghetti; [. . .] I could

have done something

else’

(Searle, in Blackmore, 2005,
pp. 204–205)

‘I do the “as if ”. And

I think almost everybody

who’s happy and

healthy tends to do that.’

(Wegner, in Blackmore, 2005,
p. 257)

‘the dreaded mayhem

does not happen’

(Claxton, 1986a, p. 69)

Can free

will and

determinism

co-exist?

Is

determinism

true (at the

human level)?

Do we have

free will?

1. Illusionism


2. Compatibilism


3. Libertarianism

No

‘Yes’

No

Ye s

Ye s

Ye s

No, but don’t tell anyone

‘Yes’ (but not free choice)

Ye s, but we have no proof

FIGURE 9.9 • Summary of arguments for free
will (illusionism, compatibilism,
libertarianism) (from Miles, 2013,
p. 206).