Is there such a thing as conscious will?

What is “conscious will”?! Having “free will” or “conscious will” basically means being in control of one’s actions. The idea is that you CHOOSE your actions and are thus responsible for them. It can also be taken a step further to the question of whether or not we are the true masters of our fate.

DISCLAIMER ! We do not intend to give a ‘conclusion’ here, because it really is impossible for us in our capacity to decide by mere logic if conscious will exists or not. We just don’t know. It’s like debating whether we are brains in vats or not. Whether it exists or not(as we will see in the subsequent slides) is ultimately a matter of faith, so we have no intention of giving a definite Yes or No answer. What we can do here is present different opposing views and arguments.

Determinism

Determinism basically means that the whole universe is a system which has been set to work with some specific initial conditions, with or without some external influence, and although it is so complex that events seem to be random at first glance, they are in reality pre-’decided’, i.e. they are caused by previous events. And we organisms are control systems programmed to behave the way we do.

But then we could just as well say that we do have free will, and with the random choices of the near-infinite conscious beings we are constantly setting off new ‘webs’ of chain reactions within the boundaries of physical laws. There are other chain reactions in the physical world not influenced by our free will, but they themselves influence us and shape the choices available to us.

Free will and God Most traditional religions like Buddhism etc, on some level, preach the idea of free will in the sense that they set down a ‘way of living’ which, if chosen and followed, leads to fulfilment or happiness etc. In Islamic philosophy for instance, we see the idea of compatibilism- that God gives man his free will to choose whether to follow guidance or to go astray. The consequences for each choice, however, are also determined by God.

Separate question: Does GOD have free will? Firstly, we can’t prove(or disprove) that God exists. But with some assumptions, let’s do what we do best- argue. For our academic purposes here, we’ll choose the Christian God as an example:

“The Christian God is a “personal being” who knows everything. And according to Christians, personal beings have free will. In order to have free will, one must have more than one option, each of which is avoidable. This means that before you make a choice, there must be a state of uncertainty during a period of potential: you cannot know the future. Even if you think you can predict your decision, if you claim to have free will, you must admit the potential (if not the desire) to change your mind before the decision is final.

A being who knows everything can have no "state of uncertainty." It knows its choices in advance. This means that it has no potential to avoid its choices, and therefore lacks free will. Since a being that lacks free will is not a personal being, a personal being who knows everything cannot exist. So, the Christian God cannot exist” As you can see, this argument is based on a particular definition of free will, and a particular definition of the Christian God. Some modern theologists consider God to have an inherent omniscience rather than a total omniscience, for the sole purpose of guarding his/her free will.

But how important is this question? Why bother about this theological discussion anyway?

In any court of law, you are judged on the basis that you act out of your own free will and are responsible for your actions. Try to talk the judge into the metaphysics of determinism if you ever find yourself unfortunate enough. Almost all of us inherently believe in free will. We take ourselves to be morally responsible for our choices. Moreover, we always try to choose the “best” choice by weighing our options. Any reason to think we’re not free has to be strong enough to make us stop trying to make better decisions.

Thank You Group 9: Ujjwal, Aman, Sacchit, Nikhil, Srikanth