Here is a cool little thing to think about. Even though I do not necessarily believe in this theory, just the concept itself is quite interesting. What if “free will” does not exist?
What if the human mind, the brain itself is merely a mechanism for coping with surroundings and not allowing actual choices to be made?
The mind just analyzes the interactions it is faced with in everyday activity and comes to conclusions based on the biological makeup it has.
In other words, what I am trying to get across is that our “free will” doesn’t make decisions for us.
The activities and situations we face everyday pre-determine how we will act through our individual mind itself.
Think of the brain as a computer program. Whatever is fed into it (what we view and experience) will give a particular outcome. Our own mind is just a very complex computer program, a mechanism that determines things based on what is fed into it.
Thinking in this way proves that decision-making or the individual act to decide itself is not possible.
The answer to the problems we face everyday are already pre-decided by the way our unique brain works and what the environment has in store for us. In this way, free will is not possible.
One argument against such a theory may say that an individual actually feels and contemplates the decisions that they make everyday.
The thinking and feelings of going back and forth on a decision is not merely the individual itself, but the act of the brain actually processing that problem.
That feeling of self-choosing or the idea to make any decision they choose is just a feeling. People may feel that they can choose their own paths, but actually live by the instincts their mind processes.
The best analogy to this description would be that of animals. In some cultures it is believed that animals do not exhibit free will.
Animals grow, find food, and chase cars by instinct, the same instinct that I am arguing about. Maybe their brains aren’t quite as complex as human brains, but they do process situations they are faced with to come to conclusions.
The same sort of mechanism idea I’m writing about. The major question to take from this is “Do animals feel like they are making decisions?” I, myself, believe that they do hold these feeling even though their instincts dictate what they are actually going to do.
This same idea holds true for humans. We may feel like we are making decisions on our own, but in essence, we have no control over what we actually do.
Based on this idea that has been set forth, the world and actions around us actually make us who we really are.
This topic may seem familiar, as it is touched on in both psychology and sociology. It comes down to learned traits vs. inherited traits. Both are of great deal of importance in this theory.
Even though the brain is a mechanism that processes this information to make our decisions for us, it does not always stay constant.
The mind grows with what it experiences. This mind as a computer program that we discussed earlier actually changes overtime.
The mind changes not because of the individual himself or herself, though, but from what it has experienced or learned from events themselves. The brain mechanism itself determines how it will learn from these experiences.
If this holds correct, then people aren’t born to do specific things. The environment or surroundings themselves actually dictate who a person is. People are melded into whatever they are or will become based on their experiences.
As a result of this statement, it should logically follow that it is possible to sort of control another person’s actions to an extent.
The only problem with that, though, is no one actually knows how the individual brain functions and reacts to meld someone how they might want.
Nobody knows the external factors they must face and cope with to make them into a certain individual. The brain’s workings are so complex that it would be nearly impossible to control all the workings of it.
People are not born to go on to do specific or special things. Actions around them and how they interact with their brain will dictate who they actually are.