1 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: A question for Objectivists
The emergence of free will is not causeless.
But isn't free will the ability to act independent of causality? The idea that you make your own decisions. That you are not simply responding causally to material conditions?
That's my question. At what point does the emergence of free will happen? It seems to be some degree of intelligence?
So does free will increase with increasing intelligence? If so, then the attribute of having free will doesn't seem to be itself a product of free will.
Does Objectivism anywhere that behavior can’t be impacted by other things?
If I'm hungry and decide to eat is that the "free will" that objectivism describes? Or is it purely voluntary actions.
I think I'd find the argument of free will more compelling if it was strictly voluntary actions. But it needs to be strict. Eating because you are hungry is not voluntary, saving a drowning child because of instinctual emotions is not voluntary. It's an impulse derived from a material reaction in your body to stressors.
Voluntary would be thinking about doing something, having literally no incentive, need, or impulse to do it, and deciding to do it anyway based on a logical conclusion: Voluntarily. Is that correct?
Comment by globieboby at 08/03/2025 at 04:30 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Free will is not causeless actionit is self-caused action at the level of thought. The fundamental choice is to focus one’s mind or to drift. This is the essence of volition: the choice to engage reason or evade it.
Not all actions are volitional. Reflexes, emotions, and automatic bodily functions are not governed by free will. If you eat simply because you’re hungry, that’s not volitional; but if you consider when, what, and whether to eat based on thought and values, that is an act of free will.
Free will operates within causality it does not defy it. It is agent causation: you, as a conceptual being, determine the course of your thinking and actions. But free will can be interfered with by force, coercion, or physical impairment. A man under threat, drugged, or physically restrained is not acting volitionally. However, so long as the power to think remains, free will remains.