I am quite confident that all of the Gardeners are busy readying themselves to spend some quality time with their friends and family over the holidays (and rightly so!). So, I have no illusions (pun intended) concerning the likelihood that people will have time left in 2007 to take a glance at the paper I wrote with one of my undergrads here at Dickinson (Tatyana Matveeva). But since I thought some of you might nevertheless have time to read it after the new year and before the beginning of spring semester, I figured now might be a better time to post it than once we're all back to work in mid to late January. For now, have a delightful break!
December 21, 2007
Positive Illusions and the Free Will Debate
This was certainly a very enjoyable read. Thanks for generously posting this online.
I don't think Smilanksy's view gets a fair treatment, however. The claim is that:
And apparently, the reply is:
I am not as confident in this conclusion as you and the other author are because I don't think people can quite appreciate the difference between a local, compatibilist control and the libertarian control.
It would be understandable if ordinary people were making this mistake but professional philosophers like John Searle make the same mistake. Every time John Searle talks about how you can't order food at a restaurant if you don't believe in free will (or if you think the universe is determined), I just have to go through paroxysms of disgust. (And he thinks this is such an enlightened and clever way to refute the opposing view, too.) If professional philosophers can make this mistake, then lay people will surely do.
So here is why people's perceived control will decrease if they cease to believe in libertarian free will. Because they can't distinguish between the local compatibilist control and libertarian free will, they think the absence of one will imply the absence of the other. And hence, they'll come to believe they have less control.
If you say that this is a mistaken notion, I would certainly agree with you. However, I think that most people will have such misconceptions.
Posted by: Cihan Baran | December 23, 2007 at 05:02 AM
Cihan,
I share your dismay about Searle's french fries example, but here's a question for you: how many skeptics do you know who can't distinguish between denying robust (desert entailing) freedom and moral responsibility and local compatibilist control? My guess is: none. Seems like if you're reflective enough to dispel the illusion (and Smilansky does think it's an illusion), odds are you won't make the fatalist mistake or throw out the compatibilist freedom baby with the desert-entailing freedom bathwater.
Posted by: Tamler Sommers | December 23, 2007 at 01:37 PM
Cihan,
First, I agree with the line Tamler adopts in response to your comment. This is an issue I addressed in an earlier paper that I co-authored with Adam Feltz. If free will skeptics such as Tamler, Saul, Galen, Kip, me, and others are able to clearly see the difference between the ultimate control and responsibility that we don't have(however these two get cashed out) and the compatibilist control and accountability we do have (however these two get cashed out), I see no reason for thinking that the non-philosophical masses won't be able to similarly see the difference. Indeed, I think every undergraduate of mine who has been convinced by Galen, Saul, and others concerning the non-existence of LFW and UMR has nevertheless been able to appreciate that we often have the kind of compatibilist control and accountability discussed by Fischer and others. What's good enough for the free will skeptics ought to be good enough for the masses. Of course, there is a way you could test this principle--namely, you could run a study that asked people whether they think that in some ultimate sense, nothing is up to us. Then, you could ask whether people think that on the level at which they live their lives (e.g., ordering fries and the like) they nevertheless have a direct say in how their lives unfold. The first question would enable you to zero in on the participants who agree with Smilansky that on the ultimate level, nothing is up to us. The second question would enable you to see how many of these individuals' beliefs are in line with Smilansky's prediction. If you'd like to run such a study, let me know. I wouldn't mind playing along!
Second, the quote from our paper that you identify as our "apparent" reply to Smilansky's prediction does not adequately capture the thrust of our response. The point of Skinner's view is that as we age, we slowly come to realize that in the end "luck swallows everything." That is, as each of us moves from cradle to grave, we come to realize that many of our successes and failures were the result of forces that were ultimately beyond our control. Yet, despite this realization, we nevertheless continue to believe that we have local reflective compatibilist control over our actions and decisions.
Finally, I just wanted to ask you what you think it feels like when you realize you don't have ultimate control over your actions. Do you really *feel* unfree? I suggest that you do not. The only time you feel unfree is when the very conditions identified by soft determinists and other compatibilists are not met. For instance, you feel unfree when you are externally coerced or driven by psychological compulsions. You don't feel unfree just because you come to realize that dumb luck reigns supreme at the ultimate level. That's the point of the aforementioned literature on perceived and experiential control. So long as you continue to feel free--i.e., so long as you continue to have local reflective control over your actions--you will continue to believe that you have this kind of freedom. According to the psychologists whose research focuses on control, objective, perceived, and experiential control are all limited to local reflective control. The more robust kind of free will that interests libertarians is usually called autonomy by psychologists rather than control. So, to put the point we made in the paper a bit differently, the data suggest that beliefs about autonomy (so defined) do not undermine beliefs about control (so defined). For me, at least, this accurately captures my own experience. I am curious to know whether it captures yours...
Posted by: tnadelhoffer | December 24, 2007 at 06:54 AM
Tamler and Thomas,
All UMR/LFW skeptics I know are able to distinguish between the local compatibilist control and the other, libertarian and more overarching kind of control. But then, my sample size is very small and the plural of anecdote is not data. So, I don't know how much that helps.
Will people be able to make that distinction? Here is a guess. Those who will be able to make it will become free will non-realists. Those who can't will not and like Searle, will ask the others how they order French fries.
Perhaps, we can think of this debate in many ways analogous to the debate between the atheist and the theist where the theist says "If there is no god, then everything is permitted. So if people stop believing in god, then people will just be evil and immoral."
Now I haven't seen a single atheist who fit that description - i.e. someone who decided to become immoral because there is no god. But then, there aren't all that many atheists.
Thomas, you write that:"The point of Skinner's view is that as we age, we slowly come to realize that in the end "luck swallows everything." That is, as each of us moves from cradle to grave, we come to realize that many of our successes and failures were the result of forces that were ultimately beyond our control." And also quoting from the paper: "Unfortunately for [Smilansky], it does not appear that the ultimate perspective has much to do with the increased rate of depression among the elderly. Instead, the mounting evidence suggests that several unsurprising factors play a role, including: (a) increased levels of pain, (b) physical infirmity, (c) mental degeneration, (d) widowhood, (e) retirement, (f) economic hardship, (g) lack of social support, and (h) loneliness."
Couldn't one think that people who adopt "the ultimate perspective" cope worse with a-h than those who don't? Maybe, "the ultimate perspective" itself is no cause of depression but it serves as a catalyst in combination with all those other factors.
And also, note that as people age, many people cope with the oncoming death, sickness and loneliness by having a "narrative" view of their life. What I mean by a "narrative" view of one's life is I think best exemplified by Frank Sinatra song "My Way", which is also for similar reasons quoted in the preface of Fischer's "My Way". One might think that throughout one's life one has done all these mistakes, made all these choices but still it was "one's way" - it was still your life, your choices. Whatever you did, it was uniquely your decisions. I think adopting the ultimate perspective prevents one from adopting such a narrative view of one's life and may depress people.
As for myself, I feel unfree (or bad) when I look bac on my life's failures and think that I didn't really have control over them. For my successes or things that I wanted to happen, I don't particularly care they were merely luck - after all, do you stop celebrating winning the lottery because you realize it's mere luck?
As paradoxical as it might seem, it just pains me to think that for some of the things that didn't go the way I wanted, I just *couldn't* (in the UMR entailing sense) do anything and things in some, non-modal sense had to be that way.
Posted by: Cihan Baran | December 25, 2007 at 02:02 AM
Cihan,
You state the following:
"Will people be able to make that distinction? Here is a guess. Those who will be able to make it will become free will non-realists. Those who can't will not and like Searle, will ask the others how they order French fries."
But doesn't this in itself run counter to the very prediction by Smilansky that we were criticizing in our paper? If what you say is correct, then either people will be able to maintain their grip on the truth of compatibilism in the face of the truth of hard determinism, or they will simply reject the truth of hard determinism, no? But then you cannot get illusionism off the ground--unless, of course, by "free will non-realist" you mean people who believe that we have neither LFW nor compatibilist control. But as far as I know, no one defends that view.
All of the so-called non-realists allow that we have some reflective local control, even if we don't have the kind of radical freedom espoused by libertarians (i.e., there is a difference between the garden variety thief and the kleptomaniac regardless of the truth of determinism). In this respect, I think the difference between compatibilists and free will skeptics is mostly terminological. The compatibilist wants to call reasons responsiveness and local reflective control "free will" whereas the free will skeptic would prefer not to use the term given its baggage. The point about which both camps agree is that we don't have the kind of causa sui free will that libertarians favor.
But enough philosophy for now...I have alcohol-laden eggnog to drink!
Posted by: tnadelhoffer | December 25, 2007 at 08:57 AM
"If what you say is correct, then either people will be able to maintain their grip on the truth of compatibilism in the face of the truth of hard determinism, or they will simply reject the truth of hard determinism, no?"
Yes, I think I have changed my opinion after thinking about what you and Tamler said. I was sort of still thinking when I was writing a response - that's why my response may have come across as or just plainly is muddled.
Upon reflection, illusionism strikes me as the worries people had or still have about atheism.
"In this respect, I think the difference between compatibilists and free will skeptics is mostly terminological."
Maybe so. But I guess there will be substantive differences between compatibilists and free-will non-realists (I don't like the word 'skeptic' for reasons Kip explained sometime ago) when it comes to ethical questions. For instance, could a free-will non-realist consistently support the death penalty? I think a compatibilist could - or it's at least easier for the compatibilist.
Also, once one adopts free-will non-realism, there is the further question of whether that should lead to a revolution in our morally reactive attitudes. A compatibilist surely doesn't suppose such a revolution.
Posted by: Cihan Baran | December 25, 2007 at 11:58 AM
As an avid purveyor of free will non-realism, I've come across anecdotal evidence of negative emotional reactions to being disillusioned about LFW. Some people initially get depressed on learning they don't have it, or maybe it's depression triggered by discovering that some of their fundamental beliefs are ill-conceived. At any rate, they generally get over it, and some even discover they're better off: there's less LFW/UMR-based guilt, shame, pride, contempt, anger, demonization, etc. That is, as Cihan suggests they might, the reactive attitudes get tempered by no free will enlightenment in ways that lead to greater human flourishing, according to some widely accepted standards. What Smilansky seems not to consider (although not having read his book I can’t say for sure) is the possibility that there might be positive psychological and social consequences from free will *non*-illusionism.
Posted by: Tom Clark | December 27, 2007 at 12:06 PM
I think the Disutility of Disillusionment Assumption (DDA) just hasn't been tested. While the paper usefully points out that this body of psychological research doesn't support DDA, that research also doesn't refute DDA.
The key point here is: what would "losing faith" in compatibilist control look like? As I (mis?)understand Smilansky, such loss of faith would NOT amount to doubting that compatibilist (or "local" or whatever) control happens, and happens often. Instead, it would amount to not CARING about such mundane control any more.
Don't get me wrong: I suspect that the prediction of not caring about local control is just as false as the prediction of not believing that local control happens. But I have no idea how to support my hunch using psychological research.
Posted by: Paul Torek | December 27, 2007 at 06:50 PM
Clarification: by "not CARING about such mundane control", I mean, when it comes to punishment (for example). People could still care in some other contexts, for example they could prefer to drive a toy car that has a functional steering wheel over driving one with a phony steering wheel. That would not detract from Smilansky's hypothesis as I understand it.
Posted by: Paul Torek | December 27, 2007 at 06:56 PM
Thomas, Thanks for the post, for the continuing interest in my work, for your paper (with your co-worker), and for the study and presentation of the complex literature. As both your paper and the discussion so far indicate, relevant human reality is varied and complex: empirical studies seem to produce contrastive results, and in addition there are difficult issues of interpretation as to what can be learnt from each study.
In my work I have certainly tried to express my sense of the complexity of the issues: in a broad way, with my division of the free will problem into four distinct questions or levels of discussion; or in my compatibility-dualism that rejects the Assumption of Monism on the compatibility question, and tries to incorporate what I take to be the partial but true insights of both compatibilism and hard determinism. This complexity naturally also appears in specific matters, which sometimes even go against the main theme of Illusionism, such as (to respond here to Tom Clark as well) in my discussion of "The Ethical Advantages of Hard Determinism" (PPR 1994); further developed with some other ideas in chapter 10 of my book.
The free will problem seems to me to be such a great problem to work on because it is so difficult and complex AND we can nevertheless make so much progress in understanding it. (That, incidentally, is why I think that working on moral paradoxes is so important.)
But to get back from the general issue of free will complexity to this paper. Again, to begin from the broad perspective, your paper shows that there is a lot of psych data that point to the fact that the illusion of control is critical to human well being and that we hold to the belief that we have control even when we don't. But, broadly, that is my position! It is important to see that Illusionism is a strong position because it is like a car that can run on different kinds of fuel. If a study shows that people can become easily upset at learning about the ultimate perspective then this helps Illusionism, but likewise if a study shows that people are strongly resistant to unpleasant information about free will-related matters. As long as one doesn't follow either the P.F. Strawson sort of "don't worry because whatever people come to believe nothing will change anyway" line, OR the "don't worry because although there will be great changes we can control them and they will be wonderful" line (of Kip, for example) - both extremes seem to me implausibly optimistic, if for opposite reasons - then there is room for illusion to play a central and mainly a positive role.
More specifically, the data about old people can be interpreted (it seems to me) in various ways, most of which actually lend support to free will Illusionism. Arguably most of these old folks believe in libertarian free will (which I think is an illusion), and are thus depressed for the usual and pretty good reasons that they are lonely, fear being even more ill and helpless, and are soon going to die. Their being depressed for non-FW reasons doesn't show that they are not deluded on FW. Perhaps, if they were confronted with an experimental philosopher, who would try to convince them that all their past struggles and achievements were ultimately not to their credit (they were just determined to perform as they did), and that hence they don't really deserve to be appreciated for them - then they would resist such a challenge and continue to fool themselves on LFW. But that as well would help the case for Illusionism. Or, perhaps, some of these old people - some of the more intelligent and sensitive ones - WOULD become very upset at what this experimental philosopher was saying and, if they partly began to internalize the no-FW conclusion, would become depressed. This, then, would ALSO help the case for Illusionism. I don't know if it would be very nice to try to conduct some free will experiments in old people's homes rather than only on the natural common victims of such experiments, the captive audience of young students (on the other hand, the old people might enjoy the attention). But I don't see much in the results we have so far, that would indicate that such studies would not yield support to Illusionism.
Posted by: Saul Smilansky | December 27, 2007 at 08:51 PM
Seems to me illusionism is a normative stance based on a value premise. The premise is that people are better off under an illusion about free will, therefore it’s good to preserve the illusion. I’m wondering on what grounds one would judge that it’s better to be deceived about agency than not. Me, I’d rather know what’s really the case, and maybe suffer some psychological discomfort rather than live under an illusion. That’s because I place a higher value on truth than comfort (or so I imagine). Saul, you seem to think there are values that should trump truth, at least for the masses. It’s very much like the Matrix: do you take the red pill to truth, or the blue pill to comfort? How do we decide who’s right about this?
Posted by: Tom Clark | January 03, 2008 at 10:04 AM
Hard to predict how people will react to the idea that they have no control. Some, if they believe the argument may feel a kind of discouragement, but some might just say---"well, it seems like I have control, it seems as though I make decisions and so on, so I'll just go on as usual".
Thoughts and scenarios do appear in which an entity known as "I" or "me" has done or will do something--and something gets done
---followed by the thought that it has been done by that entity.
Is there such an entity--- or is it just
the thought of such and the actuality is that the universe does it all, or all just
arises sans any entity--universal or not- whatsoever?
Seems an intuitive call to me---yes there is such an entity, or no, there isn't.
A thought or sense of an entity does not correspond to a thing--or yes it does. How to establish that one is wrong? Seems it would come down to saying the other person is hallucinating or some such.
Or what you are saying indicates an entity ---does not conform to the definition of entity, nor of truth or proof--or some such. Or, something is miss-defined and there is no entity, or there is mis-definition and there is an entity in fact--(and so we can dicker about the definition of fact==what is a fact and what is not?)
Or--- you can, via Ockham's Razor, get rid of a personal entity and just say that the universe acts. Or, no, we can't get rid of the personal entity--it is too obviously a part of things.
My knee flexes when the doctor hits it
with a rubber hammer--- thirst arises and rocky road ice cream tastes good but butter pecan doesn't--the heart beats. These are
"involuntary"---is then everything that happens involuntary? ---including thoughts and the seeming act of decision-making? Is desire then an impersonal thing?
I think it the case that regardless of the ideas backing the matter---acting will arise as will some thought or other that "I" did it or, perhaps, "something did it, not I".
or some such----
Whether that means that there is a doer or
not or something separate from a doer -which
is the actor---
No personal doer would mean what?
No moral blame for the individual body?
I think not---since you could just say that
the illegal act was done regardless of whether there was a personal entity at the bottom of it or not. So, put the offending whatever it is in jail and presume it may alter its ways--and so on.
It seems safe to say that there will still be actions done and some claim to having done them or denial of such.
Whether it is correct to posit one correct point of view here and no more-seems a good question to ask.
Posted by: wilmot sweeney | January 04, 2008 at 01:36 PM
Hard to predict how people will react to the idea that they have no control. Some, if they believe the argument may feel a kind of discouragement, but some might just say---"well, it seems like I have control, it seems as though I make decisions and so on, so I'll just go on as usual".
Thoughts and scenarios do appear in which an entity known as "I" or "me" has done or will do something--and something gets done
---followed by the thought that it has been done by that entity.
Is there such an entity--- or is it just
the thought of such and the actuality is that the universe does it all, or all just
arises sans any entity--universal or not- whatsoever?
Seems an intuitive call to me---yes there is such an entity, or no, there isn't.
A thought or sense of an entity does not correspond to a thing--or yes it does. How to establish that one is wrong? Seems it would come down to saying the other person is hallucinating or some such.
Or what you are saying indicates an entity ---does not conform to the definition of entity, nor of truth or proof--or some such. Or, something is miss-defined and there is no entity, or there is mis-definition and there is an entity in fact--(and so we can dicker about the definition of fact==what is a fact and what is not?)
Or--- you can, via Ockham's Razor, get rid of a personal entity and just say that the universe acts. Or, no, we can't get rid of the personal entity--it is too obviously a part of things.
My knee flexes when the doctor hits it
with a rubber hammer--- thirst arises and rocky road ice cream tastes good but butter pecan doesn't--the heart beats. These are
"involuntary"---is then everything that happens involuntary? ---including thoughts and the seeming act of decision-making? Is desire then an impersonal thing?
I think it the case that regardless of the ideas backing the matter---acting will arise as will some thought or other that "I" did it or, perhaps, "something did it, not I".
or some such----
Whether that means that there is a doer or
not or something separate from a doer -which
is the actor---
No personal doer would mean what?
No moral blame for the individual body?
I think not---since you could just say that
the illegal act was done regardless of whether there was a personal entity at the bottom of it or not. So, put the offending whatever it is in jail and presume it may alter its ways--and so on.
It seems safe to say that there will still be actions done and some claim to having done them or denial of such.
Whether it is correct to posit one correct point of view here and no more-seems a good question to ask.
Posted by: wilmot sweeney | January 04, 2008 at 03:51 PM
Tom,
Yes, there must be a strong normative aspect to Illusionism (but also some empirical assumptions, of course). Chapter 11 of my book raises and tries to deal with the various possible objections, based upon the value of truth, the value of honesty, the danger of political reaction, the implications of Illusionism for the role of philosophy, and so on. The prevalence of illusion about libertarian free will, including motivated wishful thinking or even self-deception and the avoidance of contrary evidence (about the existence of which which you probably agree) gives some indication that a great many people don't wish to pursue the unpleasant truths. But, in any case, a normative case needs to be made.
"How do we decide who's right about this?" Well, the usual way, by evaluating stories. I have presented in great detail stories about why the results of FW enlightenment would be very dangerous, and the stronger the case made by such stories seems, the greater it's weight as compared to other values. There is no logical reason why one cannot hold that the countervailing values (such as the importance of truth) are SO strong that no danger can trump them, but that would be implausible. If your grandmother were very religious and was just about to die, and the last question she asks you, on her deatbed, is whether there is a God, when you know how important your reply would be for her, I doubt if you would easily put forth with full strength all of you beliefs that there is no God. There surely are other important values in addition to the value of truth.
And, of course, anti-illusionists need to tell their own stories, as to why we don't need illusion. P.F. Strawson tells a Humean story why nothing can really change and hence there is nothing to worry about: I find that story unduly optimistic and complacent, but not everyone will. Similarly, compatibilists and hard determinists will tell their own stories. There is no a priori way way of deciding who will be more convincing.
Posted by: Saul Smilansky | January 05, 2008 at 07:55 PM
Saul,
Nice answer, thanks. As values compete for our allegiance, there's no overarching metric or standard by which we can rank them, which means that the outcome of the competition isn't determined normatively on the basis of a principle or principles, but as a matter of persuasion and politics (good stories, effective debate, etc. targeted at those who share some of our norms), or force. To shift your value hierarchy in favor of truth (non-illusionism), I might suggest, futilely no doubt, the following: that as kids of age 7 or 8 or younger start asking the normal existential questions, we should gently break the news about the naturalistic truth of things. They can handle it, especially if they haven't been exposed much to supernaturalism (god, soul, libertarian free will) in advance. Growing up without illusions, they'll find sufficient compatibilist basis for dignity and responsibility and other values, and won't have to be shielded from disillusionment on their death beds. My father died at peace, loved by his family, an atheist.
Posted by: Tom Clark | January 07, 2008 at 06:32 AM