JUD EVANS:
Whilst these thoughts about determinism and freewill are swirling around, I wonder if any of you guys can come up with any incident in your own personal lives, the life of your country, or indeed the known history of the cosmos which was not predetermined by prior events? I ask, because in the seminars which followed our lectures on determinism not one of the students [including myself] could come up with one? Now obviously there are some things that are predetermined genetically, the fact that you are black, white or yellow, the fact that you can or cannot have a baby because of your sex, the fact that you have no wings and cannot fly without the aid of technology. I am not referring to those types of determinism though indeed those sort of things are determined - I am referring to choices which you have made in the past which in your opinion were COMPLETELY unaffected by anything which had gone on before, either in your own personal lives, the life of your country, or indeed the known history of the cosmos?*

JON NEIVENS:

Hi Jud, I certainly couldn't come up with an example of that. But the question itself interests me. My immediate thought is that this would be a very wide definition of determinism.

JUD EVANS:

You are right that there are various forms of determinism John. The type of determinism I am using here is the so-called *hard determinism* as opposed to the other most well known form *compatibilism* [there is an *anti-compatibilist version too.] *Hard determinism* is what the title suggests - a *take no hostages - everything that happens is determined* approach, whilst the compatibilist model claims that free will is congruous with determinism, thus providing a *get out clause* for society, in the sense that because for them free will is taken to be a necessary condition of moral responsibility [for example] criminals can be justifiably prosecuted for their crimes and not plead the hard determinists defence that it was not their fault but *history is to blame.*

JON NEIVENS:

Though I guess when it comes to the notion of 'free will' the point is that we usually go straight to a discussion of 'will' and tend to leave 'free' unexamined. In this case it seems that there would be no possible example of a completely free will, but I guess for that to lead to the notion that there's no such thing as free will at all, one would have to accept that one could no more be partially free than partially pregnant.

JUD EVANS:

From my own point of view, as is well know, the abstraction *will* doesn't exist at all whether it be free or constrained. In my book only the willing willer exists. Well I realise that is easy enough for me to say, but [I must ask myself] where does it get me? In my view of determinism - the totally eliminativist view - only object exist in the world. I call them *causal objects* because things that don't exist cannot cause [have an effect] on either themselves or other causal objects. For me *cause* is always a two-sided affair. In fact the only thing that I ever agreed with to come out of existentialism was Sartre's assertion that The person who is mugged is just as much responsible for the mugging as the mugger that knocks him down and robs his wallet.

Of course in order to accept this and not view it as *a moral outrage* is to eliminate the human dimension of morality, and just view the incident objectively as the impingement of two objects upon each other. They meet. They both cause intrinsic changes to themselves and each other. They part. In terms of *blame* it is as much the *fault* of the mugged for walking down that street at this as the mugger. Now you know how antagonistic I have always been to existentialism - and when I first read that -on a Sartre list many years ago] I was appalled - and wrote back and said *Absolutely ridiculous!* It was only when I really though about it DISPASSIONATELY that I realised that Sartre was absolutely correct. If determinism is correct the mugger and the mugged are not much different to two asteroids on a collision course - neither of them are responsible for any impact damage. In other words the *collision course* of mugger and the mugged was something completely out of their hands.

I guess [to wallow in abstraction for a moment] that for human causal objects one could say that each individual object's concatenational antecedal history has programmed him/her to desire/act/respond in certain ways in relation to other causal objects both human and non-human - and this way of behaving IS WHAT *WILL* REALLY IS. Think for example of Hitler's early history the way that he felt that his country had been dragged into WW1 by Jewish cosmopolitanism and blamed the horror of post-war economic chaos on the same people. This experience determined his attitude towards them later with disastrous results for Germans, German Jews and Germany itself not to mention the horrors that happened to the peoples of practically every other European nation. What I am trying to say is that there is absolutely no
*ontological difference* between the way that Hitler existed as a *causal object* and his *WILL* - he and his *WILL* are absolutely synonymous and substitutable.

This means that intentionality or deliberation or existing in an existential modality of a fixed and persistent intent or purpose is as much an outcome of antecedal cause and effect as the unfortunate Magee deliberately walking down La Rue de la Chance Mauvaise in order to reach Au revoir Rue du Portefeuille and running into the Mugger. Similarly - This means that intentionality or existing in an existential modality of a fixed and persistent intent or purpose to rob somebody else is an outcome of antecedal cause and effect too. This means [if one accepts what determinism claims] that one has to accept that one could no more be partially free than partially pregnant.

JON NEIVENS:

Rather than going into a discussion of such things as political freedom which are notoriously hard to quantify, I think it's better to use some notion like 'freedom of movement' in a more mechanical sense.

JUD EVANS:

This is the compatibilist view. What they say is *It depends what you mean by *freedom?* For them freedom is not *being free to do what one wishes,* but being *free from constraint - as for the wheel in your example below.

JON NEIVENS:

Suppose you come across a pulley wheel of some kind that's rusted to the extent that it's immobile, and thus has no freedom of movement. Rather than trying to force it, and perhaps break it completely, you put some oil in the mechanism and go back to it after a couple of hours. You now find you can turn it with a degree of effort, and you repeat the process a few times until it works normally. Now all this is still very vague, but one can say that at each stage the wheel has more freedom of movement, although of course it could never have complete freedom of movement. In the case of 'free will' I guess one could also speak of limited choice, both in terms of a determinate range of options and also of prior influence, but I wouldn't say that's enough to rule out free will per se.

JUD EVANS:

In compatibilist terms they would say *Freedom FROM constraint* - not *Freedom OF movement.* Is this merely *word-play?* It is a tricky subject that needs a lot of my concentration. Most people shy away from the thought that they have no free will at all - it seems so monstrously counter-intuitive that they deflect the problem [like a smoker will often do if his little *dependence-sticks* are threatened.] People don't like to talk or think about it - it is something of a taboo subject in philosophy I think. I mean the implications for society are horrendous to contemplate?

JON NEIVENS:

Anyway, now that it occurs to me I have a question of my own, on something you said recently to Gary:

JUD EVANS:
*For me the most overriding, overwhelming evidence for the *Existential Imperative* is ourselves and the objects that surround us. It is the biggest and largest body of physical evidence imaginable for it is the cosmos itself, for if there WAS NO *existential imperative* there would be no existents and no cosmos and we would not be around to view the sensible evidence. Now to make such a claim is not similar to making the claim that: *God created everything* - for if he didn't there would be nothing in the cosmos*, for with my claim there is no prerequisite claim for a creator - *The Existential Imperative* simply means  *this stuff exists because it is impossible for it not to exist. * Change is thus a corollary of *exist* because if change was not, then objects would not exist in the first place - that is if *the first place* existed - which it did not. For me there was always a place and always will be and as *space* is a misnomer it must always be filled with changing existents. *God* had nothing to create and is no more than an originative redundancy.*

JON NEIVENS:

What I don't quite get here is the idea that the fact that everything that exists does exist is evidence for the idea that it is impossible for everything that exists not to exist?

JUD EVANS:

This is difficult for me to explain. I will try. I have always believed that if a certain thing happens it is then undoubtably an ontological fait accompli - an irreversible accomplishment - an accomplished fact. For me the fact that a thing happens in one way means that there was never any likelihood of it ever happening in any other way - for if there WAS any likelihood of it ever happening in any other way then THAT would be the way it happened and it would not be the way it might of happened. What this means in fact is that the word *might* is a complete redundancy and the notion of *possible worlds* is also a redundancy. Nothing on earth is *possible* *Possibility* is merely an anthropocentric abstraction - only that which is real exists and that which is real means OBJECTS - objects have never been, never are, and never will be *possible objects,* the are only ever objects. Now this is something I have always believed [I mean ever since I was a kid] long before I had ever heard of the word *determinism.*

JON NEIVENS:

Since the notion of change is important here, I presume you're talking about the totality of matter rather than the particular forms that that matter happens to take?

JUD EVANS:

The word *totality* here for me is itself a redundancy and I will say why I think this. [again a difficult one for me] Because I believe that the notion of *nothing* is no more than a primitive human folk-belief and is a story employed in order to make sense of the world in a pre-scientific age which has stuck and is still believed by certain people, mostly of a religious bent, because it underpins the story of the *creation* etc. Without *nothing* there is no *job* for *God* to do - making *nothing* redundant as an idea is to sack God as *surplus to ontological requirements* at the same time. That is why the Heidegger crowd suck on their *Nothing Comforter* [dummy*) so noisily. *Nothing* cannot exist [otherwise it would be *something.* This means that only *that which is material exists* If you remember in the old days I was always on my hobby-horse about *space* not existing - that it actually comprised of a Minestrone Soup of material/energy? Well now *dark matter* is all the rage with cosmologists. If the universe is a *material universe* as I have always believed, then that fact in itself makes the term *totality of matter* redundant too - for if *that which is material* is all there is, then the *totality of that which is material* has no contra *that which is not material* to distinguish or to *mark out* as being different from it, and is therefore of no further use or utility as a dualistically, contrasting, differentiating nominatum.

JON NEIVENS:

What I'm unsure of is that this notion of the existential imperative seems to introduce the question of necessity.

JUD EVANS:

Again for me the word and notion *necessity* is an anthropocentrism. For me *that which is natural* doesn't deal in human-centricities. As I see it that which some people call *nature* ALWAYS takes the easiest option - and the *easiest option* exactly corresponds to what some people call *The Laws of Physics*. The fact that *that which is material* is ubiquitous - not just in the known universe, but for *ever and ever* in all directions means *necessity* is not involved -for to be considered necessary requires somebody to consider it necessary, and if that is *God* then we have to propose another *God 02* which considered *God 01* to be a necessity* and so on to infinity and
*infinity* itself is a redundancy because like *totality* it has not finiteness* to distinguish or to *mark out* as being different from it, and is therefore of no further use or utility as a dualistically contrasting, differentiating ontological nominatum.

JON NEIVENS:

Now, as I see it, the whole idea of necessity can make sense only in contrast with that of possibility, and the only way possibility really arises for us is when we imagine that things could have happened otherwise; i. e., I might say 'If I hadn't crossed the road just now, that piano would have fallen on me' etc.

JUD EVANS:

We all think and say things like: 'If I hadn't crossed the road just now, that piano would have fallen on me,' but I guess that is more a verbalisation of what we have learned by our *lucky escape* and is an open or relieved expression of our internalisation, in the sense that in future we will try to be more alert and careful when walking along the road - to be on the lookout for overhead pianos. It is also a way of
*congratulating * ourselves for crossing like we did and when we did, and repeating it to ourselves reinforces our belief that we are not destined to die just yet, and we have neatly *cheated death.* As I said above - for me *possibility* does not exist as an ontological fact - the only thing that is *possible* is what proves to be possible, and that is what actually happens. It was therefore IMPOSSIBLE for the piano to have fallen on you - for if it WERE possible it would have done so, and it would then have been impossible for it NOT to have fallen on you..

JON NEIVENS:

Generally I tend to have problems with assuming that 'necessary' and 'possible' are descriptions of the cosmos, as opposed to how we view the cosmos.

JUD EVANS:

Me too.

JON NEIVENS:

I also have some similar problems with the term 'exists' too, even without adding the term 'existence.' I'm not really sure I'm making myself clear here though, or even whether I'm making any sense at all.

JUD EVANS:

For me the word *exists* refers to those causal objects that are present in the cosmos of whose existential modalities we are aware, as opposed to the rest of the causal objects in the cosmos of whose precise existential modalities we are unaware but we know exist because they could not NOT EXIST [the existential imperative kicks in again.] So for me Kant's unencountered *noumenal entities* fill what we call *space* for ever and ever in all directions. So it is not a question of needing *proof* that they exist - it is a question of being unfamiliar with the WAY that they exist. As science progresses [I see no reason why human enquiry should grind to a halt - unless some transcendentalist maniac blows us all to Kingdom Come of course] it won't MATTER so much that we are ignorant of secernate noumenal actuality as long as we understand how it all works.

JON NEIVENS:

This is a brief additional point. You said:

*The tutor pointed out that what we chose to do was not really a choice, although it is important to the ego to THINK it is*.

I guess this raises the question of why it is important for the ego to think that? Presumably we evolved in such a way as to have this illusion, so it must serve a useful role of some kind?

JUD EVANS:

Partly childhood brainwashing I think? We are encouraged to be positive - to not shilly-shally around or dithering over what to do. The idea of self-management and individual responsibility etc is part of our language and its constant use reinforces the notion continuously. Ditherers are the butt of jokes on TV and in literature: *For God's sake man MAKE YOUR BLOODY mind up!* shouts the parade ground sergeant *Don't you know your bleedin' left from your right?* Yes, Richard's the man to give a view on this, but I think in this case he would agree that the ability to be positive and make decisions is a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes? Thanks for the usual mind-expanding and thought-provoking observations Jon.

JON NEIVENS:
Many thanks for the detailed reply. Rather than replying point by point I'll try to write a more general response.

I think I understand your notion of the existential imperative better now, so I won't focus on that but rather on the determinism issue.

It may well be the case that I'm a compatiblist of sorts. To be honest, till now determinism isn't really a subject I've given that much consideration to.

Really it's the final question I asked in my previous mail that I'm still concerned with.

For me, I'm uncomfortable with discussions of 'will' and would rather trade that in for a different abstraction and speak of 'consciousness.' Obviously I'm using that in the sense of an aspect of the brain, but the reason I prefer it is that it at least doesn't carry implications of a homunculus. It's difficult to put this in a way that doesn't involve abstract nouns, but I'm talking about those modes of existence that seem specific to humans. Another way of putting it would be to say that humans have evolved such as to have greater powers of reason than other creatures. It may be that this simply means we are open to a far wider range of influences than other creatures. But it seems clear that whilst a hard determinist believes that we don't actually make decisions or choices, the fact that we believe we do means the hard determinist has to accept that we do have at least have the illusion that we make decisions and choices. Anyway I asked before:

Presumably we evolved in such a way as to have this illusion, so it must serve a useful role of some kind?

JUD EVANS:

Partly childhood brainwashing I think? We are encouraged to be positive - to not shilly-shally around or dithering over what to do. The idea of self-management and individual responsibility etc is part of our language and its constant use reinforces the notion continuously. Ditherers are the butt of jokes on TV and in literature: *For God's sake man MAKE YOUR BLOODY mind up!* shouts the parade ground sergeant *Don't you know your bleedin' left from your right?* Yes, Richard's the man to give a view on this, but I think in this case he would agree that the ability to be positive and make decisions is a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes?

JON NEIVENS:

I'd agree with that last point, but surely if hard determinism is correct then we don't actually have that ability, we merely have the illusion that we do? What I'm getting at here is what possible advantage being under that illusion would provide us with? I can see what you mean about the idea of 'being positive,' but it seems that if decision making is valued the is already in place. It think it only really pushes the question one stage back, since without the illusion that we make decisions, decision could not be valued in the first place. I realise I'm banging on about this, but I'd tend to regard it as the weak point of the determinist's argument, or the least plausible at any rate. I presume the determinism expert at the Uni would have come across this objection and have some replies. I'd be interested to hear what he says, if this doesn't get in the way of your own work of course.

JUD EVANS Hi Again Jon! You make an excellent pivotal point in your last paragraph. It does open another couple of important cans of worms - or cans of important worms actually. There is nothing better than two little bundles of pink wriggly-things to get one's mind working first thing in the morning. :-)

Looking back at my own last paragraph I see that I missed out a vitally important word. But it is not just the replacement of the missing word that I find interesting - it is the implications of the critically important point which you have put your finger on in your usual, sharp, perceptive way.

Before I reveal that word to you (you may have already guessed what it is?) I want to assure you that the omission was a genuine slip [one might even say: *a Freudian slip*] and is not an attempt by me to
*retrieve my position* by changing the wording. A clue to what this word is can be seen in the second introductory sentence of my paragraph where I say: *We are encouraged to be positive...* because the missing word is of course *considered.*

My last sentence should have read: * The ability to be positive and make decisions is considered a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes?*

Now when I think about this more deeply, it means that whatever the true case concerning the hard determinists' claim that *free will* does not exist, most people DO believe that it does, and furthermore claim to recognise WHEN free will is being exercised and employed quickly, positively, confidently, convincingly and to best advantage,' and also when it is being exercised hesitantly, indecisively, diffidently and uncertainly.

Therefore in this case, you may be tempted to agree with me that most people's perception of the DEGREE and EFFECTIVENESS of the free will they believe they observe in others is a question of them judging the adequacy of the person exercising that free will, and is not a questioning of whether in fact free will really exists and can be observed in action in its various forms of trenchancy or ineffectiveness?

OK! Now it is time to address your vital point head-on you ask: *What I'm getting at here is what possible advantage being under that illusion would provide us with?*

I will answer that in this way. First to set the scene on the various types of *choice* we believe we perceive in action. If the hard determinist is correct in claiming that EVERYTHING we do and say is determined by past events, then it follows that the ability to believe that making prompt and positive choices is also a belief that is determined by past events. Likewise, it may be the case that somebody whose occupation or lifestyle is determinedly predicated upon NOT making hasty choices, but making slow, careful assessments of a given situation [lawyers, doctors [if they have the time] valuers of property, insurance assessors, jewellery valuers, would-be employers, etc.], then the ability to believe that making measured, careful and unhurried choices is also a positive expectation that is determined by past events?

Now when I re-read the above paragraph I have just written I can see that whilst it sets out the problem fairly plainly it merely [as you have pointed out] shunts everything back into the past and re-asks the question again:

*What was it IN THE PAST that deemed the illusion that we make decisions to be valuable from a survivalist point of view in the first place?*

So finally I will get down to the deterministic nitty-gritty.

The answer to the deterministically and experientially generated belief in the efficacy and advantage of positive CHOICE and decision-making can I believe can be found in the introduction of the notion of
*physical or instinctual reaction.* Ever since I read Richard's TWTWI section in which he deals with the most basic awareness of early life-forms, I have realised that *choice* is really inherited instinct passed on by a process of simple elimination. Those that reacted to extrinsic situations quicly and positivly tended to survive and those that reacted slowly or subjectively were killed off and their DNA was eliminated from the gene-pool.

I think that the whole doctrine of *choice* can be traced back to early life forms, when an instant reaction to a perceived attack was manifested in the celebrated *fight or flight* behaviour. Now *fight or flight* to a large extent must be deterministically hardwired, and determinist hardwiring is the result of the survival of those members of a given species who for the perfectly understandable genealogically determined reason that their parent lived rather than died, had quick reflexes, which did not so much depend upon evaluative cognitive abilities of the sort that modern humans are equipped with - but upon physical responses inherited from forbears who survived and had offspring. In this way we can now see that Darwinism - absolutely brilliant and world changing as it was - was really no more than a deterministic account of the way in which natural selection works.

If Darwinism were to be renamed *Darwinistic Deterrminism* and his analysis called: *The Determination of the Species Through Antecedal Selection* it would I think better describe and give a title to the actual deterministic process whereby *that which is naturally and successfully ecologically niched* at any given time survives - and that which isn't - doesn't.

Do you think I would be safe to offer the following as a epigram?

*Choice is the juxtapositioning of antecedantly hardwired and currently-informed instinct.*

Do you think that this successfully addresses your point Jon?

In conclusion I must mention some remarks made by one young lady - a quiet, unassuming Lancashire Lass who was not in the habit of making many contributions to the discussions in our seminars and was somebody who I previously would not have guessed was a determinist. I have a tiny digital recorder, so her words here below are perfectly preserved.

On this occassion there was no escape for her, as the tutor went round the class asking each student in turn his or her opinion regarding *Free Will* and whether it really existed or not. Her answer was one upon which I am still puzzling over and I have since converted what she said at the time into print:

*I think we are all determined by past events to make what we THINK are *choices,* because if nature had not supplied us with such wishful thinking and we were NOT under that illusion, there would be no real reason to DO anything. We would just lie in bed all day or stand on a street-corner and do and say nothing - for what would be the point if everything had already been mapped out for us thousands or millions of years ago?

I thought that was the end of what she had to say, but then she added.

*On the other hand, in the light of having no such deterministically inspired illusion, we might respond absolutely oppositely and behave in the most outrageous and impulsive, reckless way, endangering ourselves to violence and disease and our loved ones to all kinds of distress and humiliation in the belief that *whatever will be will be.* Therefore I think most of us walk a deterministic tight-rope between being careful and taking chances without realising that both of these attitudes come into play deterministically at the appropriate time, thankfully without our ever being aware of it.*

I think she is headed for a 1st on the strength of that! What she cleverly and convincingly pin-points here with economy and aplomb is not the importance of decision-making itself to survival, but the importance of the ILLUSION of decision-making to survival.

ANTONIO:

Hi, I insert in the text some questions for explanation (plus a final comment). Thanks for your kind replies.

JUD EVANS:

Hi Antonio! Grazie per il Suo pensiero solito che provoca domande e osservazioni. Lots of stimulating questions - thanks. I will snip most of Jon's and my own input, except where it illuminates your question and just concentrate on your observations. Yes, Richard's the man to give a view on this, but I think in this case he would agree that the ability to be positive and make decisions is a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes?

ANTONIO:

I question: what is meant for "to be positive"? Who is it the final judge for one having or having not been "positive"?

JUD EVANS:

I think like any other abstraction [beauty, success, happiness etc.,] *positivity* is very much in the eye of the beholder. However there are certain people who procrastinate to such an extent that they become irritating to others who may be awaiting the outcome of some awaited decision. A government which appears to the voters to be taking so much time to deliberate upon so much-needed change of policy may become intensely disliked and held in contempt. Assertiveness, self-confident decision-making, and a positive rather than a negative approach are said to be male traits admired by women, and although there are other male characteristics that women value in men, loyalty, empathy, sensitivity, love of children etc.,] I think it must be admitted that positive assertiveness in decision-making can be said to be considered by at least half the world's population to be a valuable attribute for sexual selection and the deterministic concatenational transmission of genetical instructions to future offspring.

ANTONIO:

There is literature about the "Be spontaneous!" pragmatic paradox, as put in a hierarchic communication relationship - see Paul Watzlawick Pragmatic of Human Communication, 6.42, W. W. Norton &Co, N. Y.,  1967, on this point. I wonder whether the "Be positive" brainwashing encouragement could be considered as a variant of the "be spontaneous" paradoxical injunction, actually vanishing any 'free will' chance of the target.

JUD EVANS:

Thanks for the important lead. Watzlawik has set up the axiom that: *One cannot not communicate.* Even if the partner doesn't say anything you will interpret this as a reaction to your utterance. Watzlawik is correct in this. In this way it must be that when somebody is indecisive and procrastinates it communicates a sense of inadequacy. BUT we may be fooled [or fool ourselves] by this interpretation, for the apparent procrastination maybe really a strategic ploy to buy some time in order that the REAL decision [already covertly decided] may be effected.

JON:

What I'm getting at here is what possible advantage being under that illusion would provide us with?

ANTONIO:

I question, isn't that illusion functional to the group hierarchy being up, since it determines the aspirant decision-maker to be a quiet puppet under the (predetermined) social hierarchy? I guess, in the absence of any shared deciding rule, any individual i. e. unruled, wild decision-making would be a danger to the group hierarchy, thus in opposition to Darwin's findings.

JUD EVANS:

I think that the whole question of the myth of authoritative decision-making is an important part of your ideas and writings on hierarchy, in particular this from your excellent:

*The Fascist Side of the Golden Rule.* http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/rossin02.htm

ANTONIO:
*This concern brought me to become a founding member of the Worldwide Direct Democracy Movement and to hold discussions about Democracy Founding Documents, General Rules and Global Ethic issues. Throughout these discussions, I always criticised anyone's attitude to foisting top-down policies on a people whose right of self-expression in the form of bottom-up proposals and participatory initiatives had been oppressed by the "No-Contradiction Principle"; a principle practiced all through their family education model to the point of becoming the common habit. Education towards aware, autonomous participation since the earliest family patterning was a key priority, I guessed, to building bottom-up democratic communities.* Antonio Rossin.

JUD EVANS:

My last sentence should have read: * The ability to be positive and make decisions is considered a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes?*

ANTONIO:

I would rewrite the question as follows:
* One's ability to be considered "positive" and a decision-maker is a plus in the Darwinian survivalist stakes?*

JUD EVANS:

Yes - that is much better.

[previously] Therefore in this case, you may be tempted to agree with me that most people's perception of the DEGREE and EFFECTIVENESS of the free will they believe they observe in others is a question of them judging the adequacy of the person exercising that free will, and is not a questioning of whether in fact free will really exists and can be observed in action in its various forms of trenchancy or ineffectiveness?

ANTONIO:

I question: doesn't the fact that free will does not exist -- as so many people, especially the determinist, claim as -- mean that it does not still, at the current stage of the human evolution? I guess, even if free will does not exist up to now, because the humans are lacking of any shared rule making it compatible with the Darwinian survivalist requirements, does not mean that it is a goal to go, that can be reached as soon as such a rule is set up. If so, the deterministic claim that free will cannot exist even does not admit any further Darwinian evolutionary step towards a better degree of survival -- if only such a step would be the case, today.

JUD EVANS:

I find this to be one of the most thought-provoking questions on this list for a long time Antonio! Nested within the question are a number of other questions - I will attempt to mention a few - but there are undoubtedly many more than I can come up with.

I will first approach the question from a hard determinist point of view and then from a hard free will point of view.

THE HARD DETERMINIST VIEW. ASPECT (A)

To call oneself a determinist presupposes that *free will* does not still, at this current stage of the human evolution exist. I would add that from my own eliminative determinist point of view it COULD never exist - for only a human causal object capable of *free will* could exist and the abstraction *free will* itself could not. To state this part of the question in a way which avoids as far as possible the introduction of abstraction and say:

*Could any past, present or future human being, robot or artificial intelligence [or even imagined alien intelligence] EVER be capable of making any choice which was absolutely unaffected and uninfluenced by any antecedal, deterministically governed cause?*

For me it is profoundly obvious that for such a fantasy step *forward* in human evolution to be conceivable there would have to be a change in the laws of physics - to the very manner in which objects exist in the cosmos.

ASPECT (B) The thought that humans are lacking of some shared *rule* making *free will* compatible with the Darwinian survivalist requirements is an interesting one, [though it clashes with my conclusions arrive at in ASPECT (A) But assuming that such a rule empowering *free will* were to be drawn up - what would it consist of, how would it be enforced, and what would be the benefits of employing it? Would such a rule enable the very abuses of dictatorship that you rightly oppose in so many of your writings? Would it not lead to chaos - which is probably the reason why *nature* has made sure that it will be for ever impossible? The only *free will* that I could ever conceive of as being of any value is the determination on behalf of mankind NOT to exercise their *free will,* for I believe that the tragedies in the history of mankind can be largely laid at the door of those that attempted to, or successfully individually dominate society were the bad guys, rather than those who were aware and able to identify the benign historic flows in the direction of human nature, economic, political, religious and scientific progress and sought to go with rather than against the flow. There was a scene in the classic film *All Quiet on the Western front* when German soldiers take a brief rest in a trench surrounded by the crumpled piles of the dead bodies of their comrades.

*They should put the Kaiser, Lloyd George, Marshal Petain and the rest of the leaders in a ring with swords and let them fight it out - there would soon be an end to wars like this,* says the bearded sergeant to his weary men.

THE HARD FREE WILLER'S VIEW. ASPECT (A) Free Willers as is well known harbour the delusion that human beings ALREADY have *free will.* So the suggestion that the development of *free will* would manifest a further Darwinian evolutionary advanced step towards a better degree of survival can in my opinion be disposed of easily. If we accept that the free willer's are correct and *free will* is currently a goal which has been achieved, and that such a rule is already set up, then in this case it is only necessary to mention even a few *evolutionary achievements* which *free will* has brought about - such as the New York Tower block destruction, the carnage in Iraq, not to mention the two world wars, the holocaust, the dropping of the H Bombs on Japan blah, blah, blah. The claim that free will exists is to deny the laws of matter - it basically rejects the laws of cause and effect and claims that things can happen without cause. If we examine the process which leads to a choice or a decision we can see that any decision is based upon or evaluated in the light of antecedal experience. Now it matters not whether this antecedal experience was the causal experience of reading about it, being told about it, or seeing it on TV or elsewhere or actually experiencing it in the flesh - without some sort of previous experince of the elements involved in the choice of decision - no choice of decision could ever be made. If the decision includes words - then the words and their meaning constitute cause, if the choice involves colour then the antecedal knowledge of colour effects choice - if the choice concerns choosing which of two lemons to buy - then they fact that they are known to be lemons affects the operation of choosing between them in the first place. If the choice is based on shape, then the foreknowledge of shape is a causal factor. IMO no matter which way the free willer twists and squirms he or she can never escape from the reality and ubiquity of previous events impinging upon and influencing any action, even if that action is the involuntary rising and falling of their own breast as they breath in and breath out.

ANTONIO:

Does Nature perform free will?

JUD EVANS:

No. because *nature* does not exist. What exists are the countless causal objects which constitute the real entities that lie behind the abstraction *nature.* No causal object in the cosmos could possibly exist if it had *free will* for no cosmic object could exist as the *last link* in a concatenational chain of causal objects [causality] that went back into the black sack of eternity.

ANTONIO:

Surely, the condition of best survival were determined, at the time when, and in the territory where, a species makes an evolutionary change. Nevertheless the condition that makes the champion win the intra- specific competition for survival is not predetermined. It looks rather the product of a sudden and random genetic mutation. Evolutionists say, for one mutation to win the evolutionary competition, thousands and thousands of mutations happen and go lost. How does the determinist hypothesis explain the production of wasted mutations?

JUD EVANS:

More very important and stimulating questions! I will reintroduce the notion of the *existential imperative* here. But first please don't forget that whenever I write ANYTHING - to stick a *In my opinion* at the head of every sentence. For me the idea of the existential imperative is that:

1. It is IMPOSSIBLE for entities not to exist, just as it is IMPOSSIBLE for *nothing* to exist or not exist.
2. Everything that exists exists in the way that it exists, and there was, is and never will be any *possibility* of it either:
(a) not existing. or (b) existing as something else, for objects can only ever exist as different versions of themselves and not as other objects.

Because objects can only exist in the way they exist it means that there are physical reasons why they cannot exist in any other way. We may - if we wish- call these physical reasons *the laws of nature.* I prefer to call these *laws of nature* *the Existential Imperative.*

There are many reasons for evolutionary change. Creatures may move to another terrain either for their own reasons or through compulsion. Adaptation then takes place in accordance with the individual characteristics of the particular species. Lizard X may have a slightly longer tongue than lizard Y and catch more protein [flies] - it may therefore survive - mate with lizard Z and pass on the long-tongued gene. Lizard A might be caught in a rock-fall and lose its tail. The tailess lizard might then have a survival advantage over Lizard B - but its tailessness will not be passed on genetically - though a fellow lizard with a slightly shorter tail might survive better than its normally tailed lizard fellows. Mutations themselves happen as the result of glitches in the chemical copying of genes. These glitches may turn out to be advantageous or disadvantageous - it all depends on the nature of the particular environment the animal or plant is born into. To address your question more directly in the light of this talk of mutation - it boils down to this:

*Is it the changing condition of the territory [mountain, swamp, tundra, desert, etc.] where a species makes an evolutionary change deterministically responsible for the evolutionary changes in the plant or animal, or is the *lucky* mutant responsible for evolutionary change? Are we correct in attributing the determined chemical happenstance of mutational changes in the animal or plant as the cause of the physical advantages that manifest themselves in evolutionary favourableness?

I think both. I think that without the gradual drying up of the swamp or the moisturisation of the desert then there would be no need for adaptation and the species would continue mostly unchanged in its habitational niche [see sharks.] On the other hand without the presence of certain individuals amongst the species being significantly different from their fellows no adaptation could take place and the species would either move or die out.

A guy driving a car hits a brick wall and he is killed. What is responsible for determining his death?

1. Him?
2. His car?
3. the wall?
4. All three?

ANTONIO:

Let me conclude, it is a true luck that free will is not performed so much, for the time being, by those people -- eg. dictators -- who have been put in the social position to perform it 'onto others'.

JUD EVANS:

I totally agree.

ANTONIO:

As regards the others (including myself), their survival instinct -- according with the Darwinian (evolutionary) hypothesis -- makes them behave, i. e., make "choices", as closest as possible to all the antecedent natural instances in what is called "determinism".

JUD EVANS:

Again - agreed. tHough I would not say the *make choices* but rather *react in accordance with all the antecedent natural instances in what is called "determinism".*

ANTONIO:

Though determinism only is not yet sufficient -- according with the (Darwinian) evolutionary hypothesis -- for or survival so late, to look with sensitive eyes at today's reality surrounding us. Is it just free will, the missing element that could bring us up to win the evolutionary struggle for survival? If so, a new deal seems necessary, a shared rule not to perform it as... free wild.

JUD EVANS:

Free will is a physical and ontological impossibility IMO. Could you supply even one imaginary scenario were a decision or choice could be made without ant antecedally determined input?

Che è la Sua opinione circa le opportunità di Italia nella tazza del mondo?

RICHARD SANSOM:

I am still working on a short paper on this subject, but I decided to cut to the chase a bit. Here are some things to chew on [I love mixing metaphors!]:

One can say that either there is complete free will, or complete determinism or some mix of the two - those are the only logical choices. In my opinion what is really important is how we feel about Free Will and Decision-making, versus the importance of arguing for any of the three choices. I previously claimed that the whole matter is irrelevant, mainly since the vast majority of us act as though we do have Free Will - only a scant few truly believe that some mechanistic demon controls their every action and thought. There is a bit of fatalism involved in the belief that whatever happens is preordained, and some extremists believe that whatever they do they are compelled to do through some managing agent -- either God, Allah or *nature.* It is my belief that if one feels that every thought and action is preordained, then they believe that they can be morally excused from any act - rather like *the devil made me do it.* [Instead of the insanity defense, it is the Deterministic defense!] Therefore, I maintain that the only reasonable position, from a moral perspective, is to assume that we do have Free Will -- any other position abrogates us from moral responsibility. This should go without saying, but for some the argument is important - for me it is irrelevant, as I have said. In fact, if we do not have Free Will, there is no way to make this determination anyway, or we end up with the odd conundrums that our belief one way or the other is determined in advance -or, we are compelled by deterministic forces to conclude that we have Free Will, or because we have Free Will, we decide that we do not have it!!

JUD EVANS:

A few comments and then a brief reiteration in defence of my own position.

(1) For me there is either complete free will, or complete determinism. If called upon to do so I could easily supply a thousand examples of events which were/are the direct and obvious results of prior events. My writing of this brief message is one tiny example of an event caused by a prior event amongst the uncountable billions upon billions that have taken place throughout human history and before, and yet nobody on any internet list or in any private conversation or university discussion and in any book I have ever read can supply one single example of any event which was not caused by some prior event.

(2) I my opinion how people feel about Free Will and Decision-making, versus the importance of arguing for any of the two choices is unimportant to me because 99.9% of the human race do not even think about determinism, or if they do dismiss it as unimportant. In effect it is not a problem.

(3) I think the employment of terms like *mechanistic demon* is perhaps a little unhelpful, for it introduces an element of demonology or religion or perhaps the supernatural into a subject which is a million miles removed from any hint of *spirituality* or the metaphysical. I do not personally regard the natural, scientifically described effect of one event being the cause of another as *mechanistic,* anyway, but rather the reverse - as machines and things mechanical being the result of deterministic events. One cog turns as the direct scientifically observable result of the prior turning of another, etc. Such deterministic events can be monitored and recorded. If I lift the bonnet of my car and ask my wife to turn the ignition-key I can observe the engine fire and run as the direct effect of the action of the my wife turning ignition-key that caused the electric current to operate the starter-motor that caused the cylinders to turn, the carburettor to inject a mix of petrol vapour and air and the pistons to move up and down as an effect of the explosions taking place.

(4) The fact that some religious nuts or *nature-worshipers* believe that whatever they do they are compelled to do through some managing agent -- either God, Allah or fantasised *nature* has nothing at all to do with scientific determinism [like such activity as reporting the effects of the turning ignition key and the rest] and for many religions the *sinner* or *non-believer* is free to wreak what damage he likes, just as long as he or she is prepared to pay the price of having pitchforks stuck up their ass for the rest of eternity after death. Without this *get-out clause* God would be deterministically blamed for every single accident, war, famine, flood, tsunami, war and every child's death that ever was. Sinner's are the prerequisitorial patsies of religion - without sinners [or foolish non-Godfearing idiots] to take the rap, religion would fold overnight and priests would be toasted to death on their own confessional iron-gratings.

(5) I agree that if the world population suddenly became determinist it might cause problems for the justice system. A simple decalaration that *determinism would not be entertained as a court-plea for certain offences* would solve that problem. Any moral protest would be blanked out by a fear of the alternative chaos which would result if such pleas were to be admitted. I say *certain offences* because SOME deterministically engendered conditions and events ARE already entertained in our courts as excuses for crimes. Insanity for example. Also some conditions of women after child-birth, and crimes of passion, stealing food to ward-off starvation, or actions committed,
*whilst of unsound mind.* The ending of some loved one's pain by killing them painlessly is now accepted as a deterministically engendered excuse in most European courts and in the USA [but not in Britain] for killing some intruder that enters your home without permission. Other deterministically engendered pleas may become acceptable in the fullness of time - who knows?

(6) Regarding the fact that we are compelled by deterministic forces to conclude that we have Free Will. This is a point I have been making in recent posts and is precisely the point driven home by *The Lancashire Lass.* This is a forceful argument that could be used to back up any legislation and declaration that determinism should not and would not be entertained as a court-plea accept in special cases.

My own position for what it is worth regarding the uncovering of philosophical *truths,* is that I couldn't give a monkey's about how many people feel about Free Will and Decision-making. All I am interested in is how *I* feel about the matter of Free Will and Decision-making. The fact that a billion Catholics or a billion Muslims or a billion Hindus feel a certain way about their version of what exists does not influence me in my search for *truth* at all. If this *truth* happens to be *awkward* or *inconvienient* or raises unsettling moral questions about our judicial systems then so what? It is not the job of the ontologist to stifle research into questions that raise ethical and moral questions which disturb the equanimity of any accepted view. That is what. happened to Galileo Galilei.

Now please don't think that I am in any way comparing myself to Galileo Galilei or any other man of the past who has introduced or sought to popularise or remind people of inconvenient realities which challenge accepted beliefs or question the basis of our very own conceptions of the *freedom* of the *self.*

I am I know just an irritating and persistent small-fry midge [mosquito] compared to them, or perhaps an old [but not toothless] dog endlessly worrying a bone. I just don't like the idea of going to my death [*comporting myself towards death* as Heidegger would say] in the knowledge that I have not made every effort that I possible can have done to understand this strange old thing called *my life* without satisfying myself that I have not poked my nose into as many aspects of it as possible, and have NOT under any circumstances accepted the agendas of others, either because it it *easier* to do so, or because it is considered a *waste of time* to do so, or that it is easier to go along with how others *feel* about it. ;-)