We discussed on Thursday the idea of the clock human. Are we really just made up of a bunch of (complex) parts that once understood could be completely predicted as well as possibly controlled? In this completely deterministic idea humans will eventually be able to reduce everything about themselves to a state of perpetual cause and effect. There are three problems I have with this idea (or problems I believe are raised by this idea):
Firstly, as Dr. J stated, if we are just a bunch of gears or organs, then why is it that we are so fascinated by our own freedom and reason for existence? Philosophy, literature, and really all of the academic disciplines have spent centuries asking the most basic questions of existence (that still are not answerable): Why are we here? What are we supposed to be doing? Is there a guiding force to life? Are there universal principles we can use to guide our actions? If consciousness were just the brain working, what reason is there behind all of these questions? Assuming we are just complex biological parts, why is it that our parts feel a need to consider themselves free and question their relevance in the world? Perhaps this is just another way in which they function - similarly to the heart pumping blood - but it seems to be an odd phenomenon to me if our experience of consciousness is just a result of our brains existing.
Secondly, this idea brings up the question of culpability. We as humans tend to view someone as a doing something wrong because we believe they have free will or control over their actions. I can think about bombing the rat (to continue the question from class) but I believe I choose not to do it. We do not say, "Good for you, you didn't bomb the rat." However, were I to actually do something like that, we would say, "Why did you choose to do that?" and I would be severely punished. Why do we punish people? There are three schools of thought for what imprisonment does: rehabilitates people (attempts to teach them to change their ways), punishes them (here is something you will dislike in response to the bad thing you did), and getting them out of society (we do not want murderers roaming the streets). If everything is completely deterministic, then we cannot believe that they will be rehabilitated because they will only not do something again if given the right causes for that to happen. If the only reason is to punish a criminal, that seems like a rather sadistic approach for a government to take on its criminal population. If the only reason is to get them out of society, how long will we take them out of society if we do not believe they can change their ways based on their own volition?
Finally, this idea raises an odd hypothetical situation to me. If we were able to understand everything about the brain and the human experience, couldn't we find ways to absolutely control a human being? We have medication to control the way a heart beats (slow it down, speed it up, etc) could we make pills or probes that control the way a human acts? Could there be a pill a parent could give their child to listen to everything they say? If this is the case, what sort of existence would anybody be living? What sort of threats would we pose to each other?
These are basically the things I came up with in response to Thursday. Any thoughts, questions, or answers on them?
I think that in your post you bring up some very good questions but once they are further examined they further support the argument that the human brain is like a clock or another organ like the heart pumping blood. The first point you make that the human brain if only a clock like mechanism would not be interested in its own existence is not true. The brains heightened sense of self awareness is simply due to the size and evolution of our brains. The human brain is the largest of any species by a wide margin which allows it to have trillions of synapsis which increase the computational power of the brain. The reason that the brain feels a need to feel free is because the brain has a tendency to solve problems which it is evolutionarily programed to do because in the past solving a problem was essential to survival. Thus the brain feels a need to create solutions whether they are correct or not. As civilization began to develop and make survival easier people could turn their attention to problems that where not pressing to their survival such as their own existence and free will. Now the brain wants to solve these problem and inserts the most logical answer that it can develop whether it is correct or not. This is also the reason for how as civilization has developed so has the complexity of our understanding of science and philosophy. It is simply a result of the brain trying to problem solve at a higher and higher level.
ReplyDeleteThe notion of free will I believe is simply perceived due to the incredible complexity of the brain. There are so many processes that go into the making of a decision that it is almost impossible to comprehend the evaluation of these sequences of decisions. The decisions people make are just based on all of the past experiences and projections of what could happen if say someone did choose to bomb the rat. Many people who would commit a crime are not exactly willing to do it due to a neurological imbalance that effects their decision making abilities and or are placed in a situation that lends itself to committing a crime.
Finally you bring up the idea that if we could completely understand the brain could we not find ways to completely control the human brain. The fact is that there are already pills that can control or change the way the brain functions such as anti-depressants. Although they are not as exact as specifically making a child listen in the future as sciences and understanding of the brain develop this is not completely unrealistic. I think that if a person is taking a pill that alters their decision making process they are still living just as we would consider a person with a genetic disorder that naturally creates chemical imbalances in the brain like in the brain of a psychopath is still living.
I believe that humans are not machines and have free will. Although scientists may one day be able to make generalized predictions on how humans may act, I think that there will always be exceptions that will keep scientists studying. Even though I believe that there is free will there are many studies that make me question whether we actually do. For example, in psychology I watched a video about human tendencies and obedience to authority. In this video there was an example of a series of true events in which a man, pretending to be a police officer, would call a fast food restaurant and coax the manager to sexual harass his employees by strip searching them. As I watched the video I was appalled. I thought, what kind of person would actually listen to a man on the phone that could not even physically harm them. I was even more astonished when I found out that this had happened at numerous fast food restaurants. If a person has free will why would they choose to do something that they felt uncomfortable with, that they knew was morally wrong even if they were listening to someone whom they supposed was a authority figure? Although I do and would like to believe that humans have free will, I believe that humans do act similarly or machine-like in certain situations.
ReplyDeletehttp://mindgatemedia.com/lesson/the-dangers-of-unquestioning-compliance-to-authority/