Who's responsible if there's no free will? How did guilt and shame develop?

Q.  Michael Johnson:

Although we lack contra-causal free will, what is the case for personal responsibility remaining?  How about the article by "Michael Gazzaniga: Free Will is an Illusion, but You're Still Responsible for your Actions" published in the Chronicle of Higher Education?

Michael Johnson

Also, although consciousness lags 350 milliseconds behind the decision made by unconscious brain activity, it can still be used to influence long term decisions like whether or not to get married, have a baby, travel, etc.  Have you seen the "Free Will With Sam Harris" video on youTube?


G.

Hi, Michael.

First, let's define "contra-causal free will".  A useful definition is"...that in a situation as it actually occurred, you could have done otherwise but chose not to.  The choice was up to you...it wasn't completely determined by causal chains...but neither was it random, since...a lawless, randomly generated choice wouldn't be caused by you."

re the Gazzaniga piece, others sent as well.  re Sam Harris' video, i like his work in general; "The End of Faith" was, IMHO, useful, valuable and well-written.

Sam Harris

Gazzaniga's piece seemed to be two pieces...almost a "pay no attention to the man behind the screen approach" which is easily misinterpreted.  Harris tracked the scientific and cognitive neuroscience reality, even w/the "maybe we should just believe like we have free will, even if we don't" approach being argued by some behavioral scientists concerned about what would happen if folk realized they had no free will and there was no "guilt and shame"...to manipulate them.

There is in both...the fear that society will deteriorate if we don't believe we have free will.  Well... "society", i.e. our organizations...will handle the issue of "responsibility".  Our organizations do, and will continue to, impose consequences on actions deemed...to be "dangerous, nonproductive, harmful, etc." in some regard, to the coherence and survivability of the organization.  we were Darwinianly evolved to have behaviors that supported BOTH the survival of groups as well as individuals...which was overlooked by both articles.

Much of our enlarged neurocortex evolved for "societal" relationship issues...group "responsibility" behavior issues are genetically encoded...in individuals so that the group and its often hierarchical order will survive and function, and so that the individuals will fit w/in it, or face the consequences of rejection.

Historically, this rejection was immediately hazardous to one's survival and finding mates for spreading of ones genes, etc.  Although consequences are not as severe now, it still has significant effects; financial, social, health, etc.  One's "responsibility" to support the interests of the group is upheld.  Jonathan Haidt's recent, controversial, "The Righteous Mind" discussed the group selection issues...well...his metaphor is that we are "90% chimp, 10% bee.


Q. Michael Johnson

Thank you Gary for this reply.  you speak as if group selection is uncontroversial.  Is there some irrefutable evidence for group selection?  i will check out Jonathan Haidt's book.  Thank you!

G.

 Hi Michael, the key parts in Haidt's book are...60 pages w/some references.  The critical "scientific" element is whether there was significant adaptation/evolution over the last 12,000 years, the Holocene era, when complex, larger societies developed.

A good scholarly reference is "Institutional Evolution in the Holocene: The Rise of Complex Societies" by Richerson and Boyd...also...an excellent scholarly anthropology book, highly recommended by anthropology faculty, "The 10,000 Year Explosion" by Cochran and Harpending...

Kristen Hawkes
University of Utah

These models are certainly not uncontroversial, and irrefutable is always under investigation (as in all scientific work), but they are on the cutting edge of evolutionary anthropology...an evolutionary anthropology National Academy member, Kristen Hawkes,  and a Fulbright scholar, cultural anthropologist, both folk i have spent much time with, agree...their work was discussed in the blogpost "non-dual awakening - evolutionary step backward? or next step forward".


Haidt's "90% chimp, 10% bee" is derived from his thesis that primarily (90%), we act in enlightened self-interest..."intuitions come first, strategic reasoning second"...we "lie, cheat and cut ethical corners...when we think we can get away with it, and then use...moral thinking to manage our reputations and justify ourselves to others.  We believe our own post hoc reasoning so thoroughly that we end up self-righteously convinced of our own virtue."

Charles Darwin

The other 10%, Haidt's argues, are "mental mechanisms that make us good at promoting our group's interests, in competition with other groups...we are not saints, but we are...good team players".  Charles Darwin argued in The Descent of Man for such group selection but there is the "free rider problem", which he summarized as "It is extremely doubtful whether the offspring of...those who were the most faithful to their comrades (and died), would be reared in greater numbers than the children of selfish...parents".

Evolution solved this problem for the bees as almost all selection in a hive is group selection.  But how did it work for us?  Well, by developing  behavioral traits like obsession w/our reputations, which define how well we fit in our group, which Darwin described as "our moral sense...largely guided by the approbation of our fellow-men".  Group selection was in vogue academically for years and then it wasn't, and now it is again.

Factors identified, by Holldobler, E.O. Wilson and others, which support developing large, cooperative groups were a) the need to protect a persistent, defensible resource w/in foraging range of the inhabitants, b) the need to feed offspring over an extended period and b) intergroup conflict.

Jonathan Haidt
NYU

All three apply, obviously, to humans.  As our population exploded over the last 10,000 years, our growing organizations developed selection pressures within groups as well as between groups.  Genetic adaptation accelerated and group conflicts were won not just by wars, but by being "the most efficient at turning resources into offspring...women and children were also very important members of these groups."  These pressures optimized "moral communities" based on shared behaviors, structures and beliefs for which we will fight, kill, or even die.   As Richerson and Boyd explain:

      "...the evolution of...social instincts suited to life in such groups...structured by moral norms...new emotions such as shame and guilt, which increased the chance that norms are followed"

So that's why and how we developed "guilt and shame".

re your point about even if our actions are initiated before we are aware of them, "it (our consciousness/brain) can still be used to influence long term decisions like whether or not to get married, have a baby, travel, etc.", all of those decisions still fall in the "no free will/no control" category.   Those "decisions" occur w/in a heavily circumscribed range of possibilities determined by your genetics, environment, where, when you were born, who your parents were, etc.  With no "contra-causal free will", as you agree is the situation, "you could not have done otherwise", whatever you (appear to) decide.  

There is also a new youTube video "Guilt and Shame...are they useful or dysfunctional", a dialogue w/Rich Doyle which explores how they evolved and whether they are useful and helpful in today's world.