The Neuroscientific Study of Free will: A Diagnosis of the Controversy - Nursing Assignment Help

Assigment Task

Abstract - Benjamin Libet’s work paved the way for the neuroscientific study of free will. Other scientists have praised this research as groundbreaking. In philosophy, the

reception has been more negative, often even dismissive. First, I will propose a diagnosis of this striking discrepancy. I will suggest that the experiments seem irrelevant, from the perspective of philosophy, due to the way in which they operationalize free will. In particular, I will argue that this operational definition does not capture free will properly and that it is based on a false dichotomy between internal and external causes. However, I will also suggest that this problem could be overcome, as there are no obvious obstacles to an operationalization of free will that is in accord with the philosophical conception of free will.

Introduction
Conscious will and free will were for a long time considered to be beyond the reach of rigorous scientific investigation. This has changed quite dramatically in the past few
decades. Consciousness and its role in the initiation and guidance of voluntary action is now the subject of much empirical research, and even free will is studied scientifically.
This is in large part due to the pioneering work of Benjamin Libet (Libet et al. 1983; Libet 1985, 1999, for instance). This research paved the way for the scientific study of conscious will and free will, and it is widely acknowledged as a groundbreaking contribution.1 But there has also been a lot of criticism. Both scientists and philoso-
phers have criticized parts of the experimental method—in particular, Libet’s method of measuring the onset time of conscious will. Philosophers have also been very critical of Libet’s interpretation of the data and of his conclusions about free will. Their criticism has been considerably stronger than that of other scientists. They have argued that Libet’s conclusions about conscious will and free will do not follow, even if it is granted that the experimental methods and results are sound.2 However, the reception of Libet’s challenge to free will has been mixed within philosophy itself. Some philosophers see a need to engage with Libet’s challenge in detail and with care, which suggests that they take the findings seriously.3 Others, however, are more dismissive. They think that Libet’s findings are simply irrelevant to the problem of free will. This striking discrepancy in the reception of the neuroscientific study of free will is not restricted to Libet’s work. Many philosophers who dismiss Libet’s research
as irrelevant to free will are equally dismissive of follow-up studies that develop the Libet’s paradigm (such as Haggard and Eimer 1999; Soon et al. 2008). My aim here is to provide a diagnosis of this discrepancy and to offer some suggestions on how to remedy the situation. First, I will suggest that the neuroscientific studies appear to be irrelevant, from the perspective of philosophy, because they deploy an operational definition of free will that fails to capture free will properly. In particular, I will argue that this operationalization of free will is based on a false dichotomy between internal and external causes. However, we will also see that the underlying mismatch between the neuroscientific and the philosophical conception of free will is a contingent happenstance. We will see, in other words, that there is nothing—in principle and in practice—that would prevent an operationalization of free will that is in accord with the philosophical conception.

Conclusion
I have argued that the findings from the experiments in the Libet paradigm appear to be irrelevant, from the perspective of philosophy, due to a mismatch between the
philosophical conception and the neuroscientific operationalization of free will. In particular, this operationalization fails to capture what I called free will proper—the freedom to make choices on the basis of reasons. However, I have also argued that this mismatch could be overcome, as there are no obvious obstacles to an operationalization that is in line with the philosophical conception. Given, furthermore, that the philosophical conception of free will does indeed capture the kind of freedom that matters to us, it is clear that this is not just a possibility, but a desideratum: the operational definition of free will should be revised in accord with the philosophical conception, because this conception captures the kind of freedom that we care about.

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