One of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services' ancillary websites, healthfinder.gov, recently published an article on the latest neuroscience research titled, "Scientists Spot Brain's 'Free Will' Center." The article begins:
If you've ever been of "two minds" about doing something, a new study may explain why.
Scientists say one part of the brain is responsible for initiating action, while a totally separate area is in charge of not taking that action.
This newly identified region, involved in an aspect of self-control, may change conceptions of human free will, the researchers said. It could also explain the basis of impulsive as well as reluctant behavior, they added.
Given the recent spate of neuroscientific research that strongly suggests humans do not possess a capacity for contra-causal 'free will', no doubt some will find solace in the apparent conclusion at which this article arrives. Additionally, those of a more traditional monotheistic bent will seize upon this tidbit of research as evidence or justification for the necessity of their belief in free will. An essential tenet - possibly the central tenet - of monotheistic religions like Christianity and Islam is that human possess the freedom to choose to obey God or not - or even to believe in God or not; and that this capacity for insubordination warrants an eternity of punishment. Tom Gilson of The Thinking Christian blog writes:
And it couldn't say [there's no such thing as free will]; not without jumping off to all kinds of unwarranted conclusions (of course, that didn't stop those other three newspapers from doing the same). The research said that there appear to be separate centers in the brain, one for planning and doing things, the other for deciding not to do them. One for action, one for inhibition. Somewhere, we make decisions. That somewhere remains scientifically unidentified. I predict it will remain that way.
Yes, the research purports to show that there is a center in the brain for initiating action and one for refraining from action. We know that different modules in the brain are responsible for different things. And, yes, we also know that somewhere in all that muddle decisions get made. The research can't say there's no free will; but, equally, it can't say there is. However, it (along with most other research in this area) strongly suggests that human beings do not possess contra-causal free will.
There's no doubt human beings make decisions, but that doesn't necessarily mean that those are 'free' decisions. The most widely accepted, if inchoate or at least not fully thought out, view is that there is a little 'me' inside my brain who receives all the sensory information from my body and makes free decisions based on that information. This little 'me' is free to choose and decide in whatever way it pleases. But this concept cries out for an explanation of what makes the little 'me' in there decide the way it does? What determines how it chooses? There must be reasons for its choices, no? If there are no reasons, then its decisions would be completely arbitrary. Clearly our decisions do not seem arbitrary. We all claim to have reasons for our actions, for our decisions.
So what we end up with is a sort of Russian doll type of infinite regress: an infinite series of little 'me's' each providing the reasons for the previous 'me's' actions. At some point, in order for mini-me's actions to be free in the sense most of us generally, and religious believers in particular require, there must be a break in this chain, an insertion of a free element to the decision making process - a chink through which a god might slink, if you will. Because that's what we would have to be: each of us would have to be a Prime Mover, a first cause of ourselves. But does the idea of being a first cause of ourselves even make sense? I say no.
For me, and for those who call themselves naturalists, the debate over free will is, well, over. The more interesting part of the article relates to the consequences of being able to identify the area of the brain responsible for our inhibitory capacities. As the article states:
This study and others like it are really in their infancy, Miranda pointed out. That's important to remember, since the findings could one day have legal and other implications.
"This kind of data could have implications for legal definitions of 'diminished capacity,' " he explained. "There's a potential for informing legal definitions of mental illness and things like that."
"Much of our society is based on the concept of not only free will but also 'free won't,' the inhibition of response," Masur explained. "The difference between us as intelligent ordered social creatures and the society that would run amok is the ability to inhibit our responses, the ability to take control if a situation calls for it, to stop acting in a particular way . . . Maybe down the line somebody can develop a drug or hormone or transmitter system that targets that particular area of brain which strengthens the ability to negate responses which are too impulsive."
Aside from Masur's eerily Brave New World-ish suggestion, the implications for our criminal justice system could be significant. Our current criminal justice system is a retributivist one where we mete out 'just desserts' to those we deem are fully responsible (and not mentally compromised) for their actions. But a naturalistic understanding of ourselves says that we are fully natural, fully-caused creatures who aren't ultimately responsible for creating themselves, for good or ill.
Tom Clark of The Center for Naturalism, in an email exchange with journalist Issac Bailey, draws out the implications of a naturalistic view of criminal justice which is relevant in light of this new research about 'free won't':
Bailey: People such as Stephen Stanko, who was convicted of murder and sexual assault, don't deserve the death penalty because they are a product of their environment and genetic makeup. I asked Clark: Why do you believe Stanko had no control over his actions?
Clark : Stanko had no control over his genetic endowment and his upbringing, the combination of which gradually created his character and propensities for criminal behavior. But I think it's incorrect to say Stanko had no control over what he did. After all, he wasn't completely insane. Had a police officer been present, he wouldn't have committed his crimes. Rather, it's that his capacity for conforming his conduct to the law - what we mean by self-control in this context - was severely compromised by various causal factors having to do with his genetics and upbringing. He lacked enough impulse control, plus had other dysfunctional, antisocial characteristics, for this horrific behavior to occur.
Bailey : I believe things such as genetics and the environment influence behavior but doesn't cause them, meaning it might be harder for someone like Stanko to resist the urge to commit violence but he can choose to resist nonetheless.
Clark : It's important to see that the extent of one’s capacity to resist violent urges can only be judged by one's actual behavior. It's not a matter of having this capacity and just choosing not to exercise it out of one's own uncaused free will. To say that it's harder for Stanko to exercise control is just to say that his capacity for control is severely compromised, compared to our (normal) capacity; so he behaved criminally, while we do not. All this could be fully explained if we knew enough about his genetics and life history. If you believe that “things such as genetics and the environment influence behavior but doesn't cause them,” then you believe, as do most people, that there is this third thing, this uncaused free will independent of genetics and environment, that does cause behavior. But then you have to explain where that will comes from, and why it chooses the way it does. If you can't answer those questions, you're appealing to a mystery, and if you do answer those questions, you'll see that it all ultimately boils down to environment and heredity as they create the person. There's nothing besides these that figure in causal explanations, according to science.
The significance of all this for the death penalty, of course, is that if you suppose Stanko has free will, and just chose not to refrain from killing, then he deserves to die since he's a self-made monster in some sense. But if we take the causal story of his character and behavior seriously, we can't suppose that he could have done otherwise.
Bailey : Given that view, what, exactly, should be done with the Stankos of the world, given the crimes they commit?
Clark: If, as I believe, we should be creating a less punitive, less dangerous society, then we want to reinforce nonviolent models of behavior and make inmates better, not worse. Right now, the death penalty and many prisons model the worst sort of behavior imaginable - killings, rape, isolation, degradation - and thus further damage inmates, many of whom will eventually be released, helping to perpetuate the sort of society that's causing crime in the first place. Once we drop the free-will-based, retributive justification for punishment, there are still valid objectives of criminal justice, including public safety, deterrence, rehabilitation, community restoration, and victim restitution.
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