Discourse on Freewill (Part 1)

Alice: Hey Bob.

Bob: Hi Alice!
Alice: Can I ask you a question?
Bob: Go ahead, ask me anything.
Alice: Are human beings made of cells?
Bob: Why, of course. Arent you in my biology class?
Alice: Yup. And do cells obey the laws of physics?
Bob: Sure. Theyre made of atoms and molecules. Everything in the universe made
of such particles obeys the laws of physics.
Alice: Are the laws of physics determinate, or are they probabilistic?
Bob: The laws of physics have been determined to be certain; they are certainly
determinate.
Alice: So if were made of cells, cells are bound to the laws of physics, and the laws
of physics are determinate, doesnt that mean our actions are determinate?
Bob: Yeah, I guess.
Alice: And the fact that were having this conversation right this instant has already
been predetermined.
Bob: Youre saying that were talking because He planned for us to do so?
Alice: No, no. Youve mistaken me.
Bob: Then what do youAlice: Wait, let me explain. In the beginning, there was the Big Bang.
Bob: Im not an atheist, but okay.
Alice: No, this is not atheism; this is cosmology.
Bob: Kay, kay, whatever. Continue.
Alice: Each particle in the universe has a certain position, p, and is moving at a
certain velocity, v.
Bob: Mhm.
Alice: Each frame in time, particles move around and collide with each other,
determining their state in the next frame in time.
Bob: Which we can calculate using the equations we learned in Unit 2, Mechanics.
Alice: Exactly. Thus, if we collect sufficient data on every particle in the universe, we
can mathematically calculate their future actions with perfect precision.
Bob: What? Thats absurd!
Alice: What do you mean? Didnt you just agree with me?
Bob: No, I mean, yes. I agreed with you on the fact that our actions can be
predicted, but not our thoughts!
Alice: Whence do our thoughts originate?
Bob: From the mind and soul?
Alice: Which is really an abstract term for the brain?
Bob: Im not so sure about that.
Alice: Blah blah blah, listen to my reasoning please. Well first assume that the
principles of mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology are valid.
Bob: Thats reasonable.
Alice: What is a human being?
Bob: A collection of soul and flesh.
Alice: In other words, a lump of particles called brain and body.

Bob: Scientifically speaking, yes. Though I dont like how youre dumbing things
down to these nonsecular terminologies. Youre losing touch of the spiritual
meaning.
Alice: I concede to your concern. Thank you. Can we continue with the argument?
Bob: Oui, oui, continuez sil vous plait, madame.
Alice: Good. Weve concurred that Homo sapiens is a set of a brain and a body.
Bob: Yes.
Alice: The brain controls the body. Correct?
Bob: Absolutely incorrect. You cant manipulate speed up or slow down the rate
of your heartbeat, no matter how hard you try.
Alice: The heart is an involuntary muscle. Its beating depends on the blood pressure
in ones vessels and the air capacity in ones lungs. These things are physical and
hence pre-determined.
Bob: What about the mind?
Alice: Thats just what Im getting to. The human mind can be broken down into two
components. The memory component consists of knowledge encoded in the strands
of neural connections wired in ones brain. The working component, which operates
on this pool of information, functions ones thought processes.
Bob: You forgot to mention personality and character.
Alice: No I didnt. Personality and character are the way we interpret, analyze, and
deal with sensory stimuli in combination with pre-existing knowledge. Thats part of
the thought process, which Ive already covered.
Bob: No. Thought is logical. Personality and character are emotional.
Alice: Emotions are subconscious thoughts.
Bob: What? Subconscious thoughts? Youve lost me, Alice. Alright, look; lets
consider an example. Im waiting for the train. Its been fifteen minutes late and still
hasnt arrived yet. I am angry. That is an emotion.
Alice: You are angry because if your train arrives late, then youll miss your
interview. If you miss your interview, you wont get the job. If you dont get the job,
you will be unemployed. If youre unemployed, you will make no money. If you have
no money, you will face financial difficulties. If you face financial difficulties, you will
feel stressed. If you feel stressed, you will be sad. You dont want to be sad.
Bob: Thats what Im saying! Its emotional. Im sad. Thats emotion.
Alice: I know thats emotion! Thats not my point, though. When you are sad, you
put your bodily system under pressure and you lose serotonin, the happiness
chemical. You are being unhealthy and your body has built in mechanisms to try and
stop this. Thousands of years of natural selection have rooted out those people who
are unfit. Its automatic.
Bob: Uh I am sceptical of Darwins theory of evolution but first, explain how
visceral judgments work: I feel like doing this. I dont feel like doing that. This is a
good decision. That is a bad decision. These are instincts from the heart and soul,
not the brain. The brain cannot make such decisions.
Alice: Actually, the brain is highly adept at making probabilistic approximations and
choosing the outcome with the greatest expected value. Our mental facilities have
associated particular emotions with individual entities. For example, the image of a
birthday party increases ones level of amusement by 19%, hope by 7%, joy by
35%, and excitement by 82%. Each one of these numerical quantities proportionally
translates into amounts of chemicals responsible for a persons degree of perceived
positivity and hence utility. Finally, the person selects the option with the highest
net effect, quantitatively deduced from subtracting: net effect = benefit - harm. The

person then performs the optimal action whose expected value of goodness exists
but can only be accessed by the hidden, unconscious system. All of this happens
below our consciousness, which is why were not aware of it.
Bob: What about laziness? Your theory doesnt account for that. Rationally, its
clearly disadvantageous and inefficient in time use to do nothing. Is your logic
broken?
Alice: No it isnt. In fact, let me explain why my theory applies equally well to that
particular example as well. Its more comfortable to stay motionless. To move
expends energy and causes discomfort in the muscles, which releases negative
chemicals. Therefore, my syllogism remains logically consistent.
Bob: Assuming that what you said is true, whats the significance? What does it
mean?
Alice: What does it mean? It means that your life is predestined. Where you were
exactly ten years ago, every gram of food you ate this morning, and every single
thing that happens to you down to the microscopic details and milliseconds of time
have been set in stone.
Bob: Are you suggesting that my opinions are irrelevant? That my life is
meaningless? What happened to the freedom that He gave unto us?
Alice: You have no freedom. You are a dead marionette played by the hands of fate.
Bob: And this Fate woman has picked out which thoughts run through my mind,
which sentiments I feel, and which actions I take? Does she even choose what
flavour of pizza I like? Do I have no power over myself?
Alice: You have absolutely no autonomy at all. Also, by the way, I mean fate as in
the force that presupposes events, as opposed to the divine beings in ancient
mythology.
Bob: But fate alone cannot control the entire universe. At least, it cannot control
God.
Alice: Oh yes it can. By definition, the universe contains everything, including God.
Science has shown that everything in the universe is made of particles. These
particles rigidly follow the stringent laws of physics. Physics is real-world
mathematics. These mathematical equations form a mechanical system, a giant
robot so complex that nobody understands it fully, so intricate that it gives the
illusion of natural freewill. It actually directs your whole life like a prewritten film
strip running at a constant pace until it is out of tape and you are dead. You never
get a chance to alter whats printed on the tape since you exist within the tape
itself. Characters from a cartoon show cannot jump out of the TV and edit their own
movie. You are not the producer. You are the product. Youre trapped in the great
sequence of happenings. You are nothing but a giant mush of protons, neutrons, and
electrons bouncing around erratically in three-dimensional space. So is a rock. You
are as alive as a rock
Bob: Stop! Stop! Stop! Youre wrong! I am not a rock! I am a human. I think. I feel. I
cry. I laugh. I hate. I love.
Alice: Your thoughts and feelings are nothing but meaningless patterns of chemical
equations arranged within a clump of mass called the brain. Your brain is another
random lump of atoms bouncing around. In fact, the rock also has particles
bouncing around in its own fashion. By the rocks standards and from its point of
view, it deems those patterns to be true thought and your collection of particles
to be meaningless and unimportant. You are looking at things from a narrow-minded
and biased perspective, claiming that you are of a superior type, that everything
related to a pattern of molecules similar to yourself is special. So does the rock. It

also believes that its the most special thing in the universe, and that you are from
its perspective, nothing but a rock. What is thought? Youve defined thought in
terms of your own processes. From the rocks philosophy, it could define thought in
terms of its own processes. Whos right?
Bob: Im right. I know Im right because of instinct. I can feel it in my soul.
Alice: The rock is right. The rock knows its right because of instinct. The rock can
feel it in its soul.
Bob: Alice, thats ridiculous! Rocks dont have souls!
Alice: Bob, lets say you meet a random stranger on the street. You think youre
better than she. She thinks shes better than you. Whos right? Of course you say
youre right. But she says shes right. You can try to convince her that youre better,
but shell try to convince you that shes better. If I were a third stranger, an
impartial member of the jury, then I would say that neither of you is better. Youre
both strangers to me. Youre both using the same crappy argument. Neither of you
is special to me. Actually, standing in my own shoes, I would argue that Im the
best. See? You cant make definite conclusions like that out of the blue, with your
conceited ignorance as the only justification of your self-designated superiority.
Nobody believes you besides yourself.
Bob: Alice, seriously though. You cannot possibly, as a healthy and sane person,
trust this fate stuff they taught you in English class. It doesnt even make sense to
me. Its impractical andAlice: This is not the same fate from those Greek classics we studied! This is pure
and objective science! Bob, how many times do I have to remind you of that?
Bob: Calm down! I have a proposition, too.
Discourse on Freewill (Part 2)
Bob: I propose that whether or not we have freewill from the forces of fate, we
would always be wiser to act as if we do have freedom. Its somewhat similar to
Pascals Wager, which argues that its better to believe in God whether or not He
exists.
Alice: The problem is that you cant choose whether or not you believe in fate. Fate
itself has decided that for you. Your thoughts are all pre-processed.
Bob: Pre-processed? My dear friend is using computer geek jargon again.
Alice: Youve lost the argument.
Bob: You have not won the argument. Plus, your turn is over. Listen to my reasoning
now.
Alice: Attack me. I welcome you.
Bob: First of all, if fate exists, then we are powerless to do anything about it.
Alice: True.
Bob: The only case we need to consider is the one where fate doesnt exist.
Alice: Fate doesnt exist? Thats impossible!
Bob: Hey, hey, hey. I gave you my undivided attention throughout your lengthy
speeches. Tit-for-tat and pay me the same respect now that its my turn.
Alice: Sorry, I wont interrupt anymore. Shoot for it.
Bob: Assume that fate doesnt exist. Then there are two types of people. First, is the
person who believes in fate. Second, is the person who doesnt believe in fate.
Alice: I do believe in fate.
Bob: If you believe in fate, then you shouldnt need to worry about anything. Since
your life is predetermined, why are you even coming to school? It wouldnt make a

difference because you know youre going to end up at the same place, be it
heaven or hell; your results are completely unrelated to how much time you spend
studying and how dedicated you are to your job. Every event in your life has been
pre-decided, and you cant change anything, whether you aim to succeed or fail.
Alice, youre in third year. Why are you practicing for interviews? Doesnt fate
decree whether you get an internship or not? You cant change your likelihood of
finding a job, regardless of how much you prepare in advance. You said you prefer
anything to homework, especially gardening, which is your favourite pastime. Quit
college and go water your garden. You might as well get drunk and jump out the
window, since fate will lead you to the same destiny, no matter what you try to do.
Alice: Theres a fallacy in your analysis. I choose to not jump out of a building
because fate selected for me to have an intelligent level of common sense
adequate to prevent me from making such a stupid mistake. Also, another loophole
is
Bob: Okay, okay! Good for you. But let me finish first, alright?
Alice: Sure, finish your point. Once youre done, Ill shred your argument to pieces.
Go on.
Bob: On the other hand, if you dont believe in fate, you might not necessarily be
better off than if you did believe in fate, but at least you certainly wont be worse
off. Lets consider the jumping-out-the-window scenario. If fate exists, then theres
nothing you can do. Fate may order you to jump or not jump. If fate wants you to
jump, you jump. If fate doesnt want you to jump, you dont jump. Its as simple as
that. Your personal preference is irrelevant to fates intractable decision, and either
way, your belief or disbelief in fate has no effect on the final outcome. You would
expect the same return in this case as in the previous case, where you did believe in
fate. However, if fate doesnt exist, then heres the difference. In this case, its
better to not believe in fate than to believe in fate, because with the conscious
knowledge that you can choose your own destiny, you wouldnt jump out the
window. And thats good because you just saved your life. Therefore, regardless of
which case is true, its better to be safe than sorry; its better to act with the
assumption of freewill than to subject oneself to the illusion of fate and miss out on
a precious opportunity.
Alice: Why the heck should anyone, and what kind of mentally healthy person would
jump out a window anyway? Your analogy is really unrealistic!
Bob: Why do you have to nitpick at my examples? Look, either way, if you believe in
fate, you will leave things to chance and make many irresponsible actions. If you
dont believe in fate and take the reins of life in your own hands instead, you will be
independently proactive in your career and receive the satisfaction of hard-earned
success.
Alice: This entire debate is pointless, and since the very beginning of our
conversation, your ideas were totally meaningless.
Bob: Ah, so youre a nihilist? Wow! I didnt know that.
Alice: No, no, no! Im not a nihilist. Listen. Whether or not you believe in fate falls
outside the realm of your control. Only fate has the power to pick whether you
believe in fate. You dont. You may think youre making a conscious choice right
now, free of exterior influence, but youre not. Youre just spitting out the lines that
fate has designated to your character in the theatre of life. Fate, the playwright, has
foreseen that you are sceptical of and interrogate its transcendental clutch over
your freedom of belief. After pondering over what to do in each circumstance, you
think you can now act in your own interests, but thats an unfounded presupposition

as conceited as it is inaccurate. When you stood at the fork in the road in front of
the tall oak tree, you said, I wish to walk the left path. So then you went left.
However, it is fate that designed you in such a way that you preferred the left road.
It is fate that had thrown at you the experiences and circumstances to condition you
in such a way that you chose to turn left. You think that you think, but you cannot
actually think. You are under the illusion that you decide, but you never really get
to decide. You believe that you have freewill, but you dont truly have freewill.
Bob: Awesome! So that means were slaves of the stars?
Alice: Yeah, pretty much.
Bob: Well, well! By that logic, I shouldnt even be paying any attention to you right
now. If I listen to you, I am a slave of fate. If I dont listen to you, I am still a slave of
fate. We might as well quit this absurd discussion and go do our homework.
Alice: Great idea, Bob! Unfortunately, I already wasted half an hour of your valuable
time. And you couldnt have done anything about it, because fate had you listen to
the indisputably ultimate and inevitably evident truth I revealed.