Q&A: A Question About the Term “Choice”
A Question About the Term “Choice”
Question
I have to say I really enjoyed listening to you in the debate about free choice. Are any debates/podcasts on this planned for the future?
And also a question about terminology: what is “free” choice? Free as opposed to what?
Aviv said that we have choice, but not free choice. That concept is not clear at all—what does choice mean from a deterministic perspective? Physical processes in the brain that are subject to the laws of nature—I cannot choose otherwise any more than water can flow from below upward.
So it seems to me that the term free choice is confusing. The question should be: on what basis is the action carried out? Is it by physical processes in the brain or by something else (a soul)? Is the feeling that we choose a fiction or not? And in the end this is dualism versus determinism, so it falls under the category of belief. In any case, it is very hard for me to think that this world would just be for nothing, and would ultimately lead to a human being who asks himself this question.
Answer
I don’t know. I assume not on the same topic.
Aviv holds a position called compatibilism, which maintains that one can speak of free choice even within a deterministic picture (if I choose without dictates “from the outside”). In my view that is just wordplay, as I explained in my book and in the article that summarizes it.
Dualism also does not necessarily mean that we have free will. There could be determinism of the spirit as well. But the reverse is true in my opinion: free will can probably exist only within a dualistic picture.