Free Will: Fact or Fiction

[Angrboda]

people down decide where they go

Repeated observations of human beings shows that they do decide where they go. For example, every day billions of people go to their place of work or school, and then later in the day return to their own home .

The question is not "do we make decisions," but rather, are the decisions we make freely made? And what would that mean?

The computer you're using is making thousands of decisions a second. Not one of them is a freely made decision. They are all determined by its programming, its history, and its hardware. There is a robot race that is run in the southwest United States each year (or was) where robotic computers would pilot cars along a desert race course to see whose robotic pilot was the best. The first few years, the results were abysmal, as the problems of computer processing of perception were far greater than anticipated. I believe that the first year it was run, not a single robot finished the race. Over the years, however, the programs and hardware got better to the point that a robot pilot could successfully navigate the course. These robot pilots make millions of decisions about where to go. None of those decisions is an example of free will. Simply saying we make choices isn't an argument. A sunflower chooses to face the sun. The mere existence of decisions and choices is insufficient to demonstrate the existence of free will.

Anymore, I reduce the constraints on human behavior down to two strategies.
1. Antagonizing behaviors that agonize discomfort and anxiety (reduce behaviors which increase pain or displeasure; e.g. distracting yourself from worrying about that promotion)
2. Agonizing behaviors that antagonize discomfort or anxiety (increase behaviors that reduce [subjective] discomfort; e.g. eating when we feel hungry)

Figuring out what actions best satisfy these overriding goals at any moment may require balancing any number of competing desires and anticipated outcomes, e.g. satisfying that seven year itch with an extra-marital affair, or taking your honey on a cruise to "reignite the passion." However, I would argue that the human organism always seeks what it considers to be the ideal compromise amongst all factors. If this is true, then its choices aren't free, as it will always choose what it thinks is best, and what it thinks is best wasn't itself chosen the moment before, but rather determined by its past history. (e.g. If you have neither slept, eaten or urinated in 72 hours, there is a much higher than normal chance that you will choose eating, pissing or sleeping as the ideal option. You didn't freely choose that probability; it was a precondition of your choice, and in this instance, clearly determinative of the outcome.)

The existence of choosing or deciding doesn't demonstrate free will.