{"id":2229,"date":"2013-05-10T23:10:13","date_gmt":"2013-05-10T22:10:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/?p=2229"},"modified":"2013-05-10T23:35:58","modified_gmt":"2013-05-10T22:35:58","slug":"things-that-iders-dont-understand-part-3-we-still-make-choices-even-if-free-will-is-illusory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/things-that-iders-dont-understand-part-3-we-still-make-choices-even-if-free-will-is-illusory\/","title":{"rendered":"Things That IDers Don’t Understand, part 3 — We still make choices, even if free will is illusory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over at UD, Salvador Cordova criticizes<\/a> a statement by Jerry Coyne that appeared in a USA Today column<\/a>:<\/p>\n

So if we don’t have free will, what can we do? One possibility is to give in to a despairing nihilism and just stop doing anything<\/i>. But that’s impossible, for our feeling of personal agency is so overwhelming that we have no choice but to pretend that we do<\/i> choose, and get on with our lives.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There are a lot of problems with Cordova’s post (which we can address in the comments), but I do agree that Coyne’s statement is problematic and warrants criticism. Ironically, Coyne’s misunderstanding is shared by many ID proponents — hence the title of this post.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Coyne’s error is in this statement:<\/p>\n

…our feeling of personal agency is so overwhelming that we have no choice but to pretend that we do<\/i> choose…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There’s no need to pretend, because we actually do<\/i> choose — even if free will is illusory, and even if our choices are determined. Look at the definitions Google provides for the word ‘choose’:<\/p>\n

1. Pick out or select (someone or something) as being the best or most appropriate of two or more alternatives.<\/p>\n

2. Decide on a course of action, typically after rejecting alternatives: “he chose to go”.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These definitions work even if free will doesn’t exist, and they work even if every choice we make is ultimately determined by forces outside of our control. Determined choices are still choices — we gather information, we evaluate alternatives, and we make a decision based on our desires and our reasoning.<\/p>\n

[Note: For the record, I am a compatibilist, meaning that I think we have free will, in a meaningful sense, even if determinism is true.]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over at UD, Salvador Cordova criticizes a statement by Jerry Coyne that appeared in a USA Today column: So if we don’t have free will, what can we do? One possibility is to give in to a despairing nihilism and … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mind-and-brain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/theskepticalzone.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}