Free Will: Part III

The Science of Consequences

Introduction

We usually take for granted that the evolutionary history of humans, like that of lower animals, has been determined entirely by genetic evolution. However, there is now convincing scientific evidence that once culture emerged in groups of humans, a complex mix of natural and cultural selection started to shape the course of human behavior and therefore the culture. Culture as information is transmitted to each other, is a social process that has driven cumulative individual and group learning beyond multiple generations. It has shaped the evolution of human physiology, brain-behavior, for more than 100,000 years. This has created the environmental contingencies for the development of cultural behavior such as cooperation with non-kin, sharing of food, exchange of goods, labor cooperation, technological innovation, religion, healing practices as well as cooking among many other things. Genetic and cultural evolution exert mutual influences. Cultural change is an evolutionary process so the study of evolution is not the sole domain of biology. A comprehensive analysis of human behavior and how it drives cultural evolution requires integration of the effects of the environment/culture and biology/neurosciences on individual behavior. We need to not only look at the proximate causes of behavior but also integrate the cumulative effects of an evolving culture/environment to understand and manage behavior. When humans developed the unique ability for social learning and imitation, culture came into the picture. Culture is the ultimate expression of these skills. Evolution is actually everywhere! Selection by consequences is imperfect and many times can lead to unwanted negative outcomes. Some, like the evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson in his 2020 book This View of Life, have argued in favor of guiding the evolution of our culture to avoid unwanted negative consequences.

The Science of Consequences

In her book, The Science of Consequences: How They Affect Genes, Change the Brain and Impact Our World (2012), Susan Schneier takes us on a broad tour of the role consequences play in impacting our individual behavior, genes, neurophysiology, and our environment/culture at large. The effects of consequences are ever present, most often hidden from our view so many times we do not even think about them until it is too late like gaining weight over time from an unhealthy diet and having a sedentary lifestyle. Consequences influence the creation of new synapses in the connectivity of the brain, the myelination of axons in order to speed up the processing of environmental input, the growth and development of the brain, and of course behavior and the health of our culture. By reading Schneier's book, we become fascinated by learning the effects of consequences in evolution, genetics, neuroscience, and our own personal behavior and that of groups impacting our ongoing cultural evolution.

The fact is that consequences shape our individual behavior and make us unique. It also sets the stage, based on your own personal experience, for a repertoire of learned behavior to be emitted under the same or similar circumstances under which you learned the behavior. These emitted behaviors seem to the individual like they were self-initiated (free-willed) but in fact, the behavior emitted is a variance of behavior that you have learned from previous experiences with the consequences that followed your behavior at the time. The fact is that the specific emitted behavior can be shaped and changed with exposure to new consequences for the emitted behavior over time. So we can change bad habits. It takes intent to change. However, behavior does not change if you only [free] “will it” to change. It takes a change in the arrangements of the contingencies in your environment over time and the intent to change it.

Behavior Explained: Is it Really that Simple?

The Natural Science of Behavior

When we observe our own behavior, we are usually not conscious of the fact that there is a learning history (neuronal networks that are connected from experience/consequences) as to why we do what we do under a given circumstance as well as a pattern of choices we make that are likely to be predictable and reliable (if we knew a person's learning history but this is usually hidden from us). We are a product of our learning history, shaped by our unique interactions with the environment nested within the culture we live in. What we recall is not always perfect, it is a reconstruction. If we want to understand under which conditions a behavior we emit occurs we need to look at our learning history which is almost always blind to us and others. The science of behavior analyzes and explains behaviors by the three-term contingency; that is the ABCs of behavior analysis:

• Antecedent: The events/actions that occur immediately before a behavior.

• Behavior: What the person does.

• Consequence: That which immediately follows the behavior (actions/responses). These include positive and negative reinforcement/punishment (see our 3/5/23 post for definitions and examples)

Behavior is shaped, learned, maintained, and eliminated by applying the ABCs of nature. The ABCs are everywhere and the effects are happening all the time, most often without us knowing or planning.

2. The Synaptic Self, Behavior, and Choices

Our biological synaptic self is shaped and pruned throughout life by our experiences with the environment and our consequences with the contingencies in place. It is the interaction of your central nervous system/brain with your environment that shapes your synaptic self…YOU! YOU govern your learned behavior and allow you to make choices based on your past learning and environmental experiences. The human brain allows you to act and make choices with awareness or unawareness by real-time evaluation of alternatives in terms of previous learning from a breadth of previously experienced situations and their anticipated usefulness in the present environmental circumstance. This learning takes place in the context of the learned synaptic self, which has been demonstrated to start neuronal wiring and learning in the womb. In the end, it gives you a “sense” that you are in control and you're making decisions out of your Free Will. In fact, your previous life experiences with consequences have shaped your decision-making process and you pick and make a choice based on previous experience. Some even say that “Free will is a necessary illusion.” Is it?

3. Selection by Consequences

Skinner (1981) published in Science one of his most important papers, Selection by Consequences. In the summary Skinner noted:

“Selection by consequences is a causal mode found only in living things, or in machines made by living things. It was first recognized in natural selection, but it also accounts for the shaping and maintenance of the behavior of individuals and the evolution of cultures. In all these three fields, it replaces explanations based on the causal modes of classical mechanics. The replacement is strongly resisted. Natural selection has now made its case, but similar delays in recognizing the role of selection in the other fields could deprive us of valuable help in solving the problems which confront us.”

Skinner addressed the principle of selection by consequences as a causal mode at three different levels: 1) phylogeny (the biological evolution of species from ancestors’ population); 2) ontogeny (the development of behavior patterns within an individual’s repertoire during its own lifetime by exposure to consequences), and 3) culture - that is behavior driven  (the development of coordinated practices within a circumscribed verbal community). The study of selection by consequences is quite important to study a wide range of phenomena in the biological and behavior analysis sciences. They range from understanding the evolution of the species, and the shaping of individual behavior, as well as to how cultural practices are selected.

Culture is the environment in which we behave. Behavior creates the culture by passing information from person to person via social learning, verbal exchange, direct teaching, observation, and imitation. Cultural practices evolve, and the cultural environment is shaped by human behavior. The contingencies that shape the behavior of individuals in a culture also evolve and behavior can drift, unguided, and can evolve in cultural practices that may have unintended negative consequences for the culture. Some of these unintended consequences seem to be quite prevalent today such as violence, individualistic behavior as well as a high frequency of people not following the rules of society. Is that what believing in Free Will does to us?

Skinner concludes his publication in Science with this warning:

“A proper recognition of the selective action of the environment means a change in our conception of the origin of behavior which is possibly as extensive as that of the origin of the species. So long as we cling to the view that a person is an initiating doer, actor, or causer of behavior, we shall probably continue to neglect the conditions which must be changed if we are to solve our problems”

Free Will and Science

The concept of Free Will is hard to define but it has become crucial for our social and cultural life. Cross-cultural studies have consistently demonstrated that most people, across diverse cultures, do believe in Free Will. The whole legal system in most countries is built on the concept of moral responsibility associated with acting out of our own Free Will. Philosophers for centuries have argued that moral responsibility is not compatible with determinism. They have also taught and reinforced the belief of most people worldwide that our universe is indeterministic. The fact is that most people have been instructed that we have Free Will, though what exactly this amounts to is much less certain. Since the concept of Free Will has multiple interpretations, it is not a reliable guide for the conduct of our behavior. David Hume, the philosopher, has noted that the question of the nature of Free Will is “the most contentious question of metaphysics.” Figuring out what Free Will is is not a simple task. It always escapes us, maybe because there is no such thing as Free Will.

The Catholic Church teaches that all humans have Free Will and this Free Will is God-given, one has the ability and the Free Will to make their own decisions and choices. Theologians of the Church universally embrace the concept of Free Will, but generally do not view Free Will as existing apart or in contradiction with grace. Grace, in the Catholic Church, is defined as “participation in the life of God.” Belief in Free Will is not a Catholic dogma, defined as “a truth revealed by God, which the magisterium of the Church declares as binding.” It is a fact, based on Church scholars, that the concept of Free Will is not found in the bible. The term Free Will was introduced by Christian philosophy in the 4th century CE. Late into Church history founded by Jesus in the first century. Since free will is not a Catholic Dogma and is not binding, the Church should be open to accepting reliable convergent evidence from science that Free Will is an illusion. There is still the hurdle of so many people believing in Free Will, whatever it means to each. 

There is good news from Pope Francis. In an article written by Peter Ellerton for The Conversation (October 14, 2019) titled Pope Francis and the Catholic Church Continue to Look Towards Science, and that Can Only be a Good Thing, noted; “In many ways, Pope Francis has embraced science as a way of learning about the world.” His message is to move away from the concept of having dominion over the earth and encourages stewardship of it. Faith and facts are not always at war. This creates a healthy environment to evaluate the merits of continuing to believe and promote the unscientific concept of Free Will. In our view, the belief in Free Will has many unintended negative consequences.

Contributions from Neuroscience

In his book Free Will (2012), the neuroscientist Sam Harris, warned us “most of what is distinctly human about our lives seems to depend upon our viewing one another as autonomous persons, capable of free choice. If the scientific community were to declare Free Will an illusion, it would precipitate a culture war far more belligerent than the one that has been waged on the subject of evolution.” He may have a point.

Harris, as we have discussed previously, also notes “the idea of free will emerges from a felt experience.” We feel that when we act, we are the initiators of our behavior, and we are not determined. Many times this feeling is reinforced by the fact that often when we act we have choices. Harris reminds us, “The feelings of freedom arise from our moment-to-moment ignorance of the prior causes of our thoughts and actions.” In fact, private events, such as self-talk and internal verbal behavior, can play a major role in our decision-making. Those private events are learned behavior and part of our history that help us guide our decision-making process from previous experience with the consequences of our previous actions. More on this very important topic of private events in our next posting.

Harris also argues that Free Will is actually more than an illusion since it cannot be made into a coherent concept; “Either our wills are determined by prior causes and we are not responsible for them, or they are the product of chance and we are not responsible for them.” He concludes, “There is no question that our attribution of agency can be gravely in error.”

With the significant developments in neuroimaging techniques, some neuroscientists have initiated the study of volition as initiation and especially the analysis of the important differences between the initiation of voluntary behavior and reflexive behavior. These studies are fraught with multiple conceptual and methodological problems and the most significant is how do you know that any brain activity that you measure is or is not a measure of Free Will.

We are not very optimistic about biology alone explaining or not explaining Free Will. Studies that have investigated Free Will based on many different definitions cannot establish a cause-effect relationship since we do not know what Free Will is and cannot be operationally defined and brought under precise experimental control, nevertheless, these studies have helped us understand the brain regions that are involved in the intention, initiation and executive control over “voluntary” actions. The fact is that these neurophysiological activities observed can be caused by other previous experiences and therefore are influenced by variables outside the person’s immediate control.

It is our opinion that neuroscience alone will not answer the question of Free Will. Neuroscience is not the direct study of behavior, it is the study of the neurobiology of behavior that in great part is influenced by the environment/behavior interaction. Harris, as noted in our last essay, emphasizes that “If the laws of nature do not strike most of us as incompatible with free will, that is because we have not imagined how human behavior would appear if all cause-and-effect relationships were understood.”

The Natural Science of Behavior: This is How It Looks

When we behave, we believe and feel that we have Free Will. This feeling and belief are so entrenched in our culture and daily life that it is quite difficult to conceive it in any other way. We deliberate and make a choice among a few that we can make and assume that there is more than one choice/action we can perform. When we look back and regret the choice we made or the action we took, we get upset because we assume that we could have chosen and done otherwise. When we look forward and make plans, we assume we have control over our behavior and actions and can mold freely the direction of our lives (if we can manage and arrange our environment effectively, we can exercise effective control over our behavior intentionally and accomplish a behavior goal like losing weight or saving money for the future). Determinism makes claims about the universe; in general, it argues that everything that happens, including your choices, is determined by the natural laws of behavior; that is my past experiences and consequences that have shaped and determined my choices and behavior. My past experiences shape my future choices and behavior. The environment in which we behave has so much control. Knowing this is good, since intentionally, making gradual changes in the environment changes behavior over time. Science sets out to discover the cause/effect laws of nature. Once they are well known and established, they usually change our view of life and we can set out to use the laws of nature intentionally to benefit the culture and us as individuals.

Johnston, Pennypacker, and Green (2020) published Strategies and Tactics of Behavioral Research and Practice - Fourth Edition. They address the argument of Free Will versus Determinism as follows:

“The argument about whether variability in behavior is intrinsic or extrinsic is just another way of talking about free will versus determinism. As human culture and language evolved, people tended to invent explanations for the events in their daily lives for which they had not yet discovered explanations. Of course, these invented explanations were usually false. Scientific discoveries of the last century or two have greatly reduced the popularity of invented causes for most physical phenomena. (We no longer believe that life generates spontaneously or that the earth is flat.) It has been more difficult to overcome the endless assumptions about human nature. 

One of the more persistent convictions people often share is that each person is free to make decisions and take actions that are not influenced by outside events. In other words, many assume that human behavior is often free in the sense that it is not caused by any specific factors. It is easy to appreciate why this seems so obvious. Most people do not understand the real causes of human behavior, which are complex and sometimes poorly understood even by scientists. As a result, we are usually unaware of the factors that actually influence our actions. Our language encourages us to assign causation to our“selves” rather than to influences in the physical world. So we say that we did something because “we wanted to” or that “we changed our mind.”

In his book Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971), B. F. Skinner tried to show that such assumptions about human nature are actually quite troublesome. They get on the way to understanding how our behavior is affected by our experiences. In turn, this limits our ability to grow personally or to learn to be more successful in our daily lives. In fact, if it were really true that some aspects of human nature were without causes, it would be very discouraging. Assuming that certain aspects of behavior are “free” means they are without causes, which is the same thing as saying they are random or capricious. If this were so. It would be pointless for scientists to study behavior because it would be impossible to find consistent relations between behavior and environmental variables.

It should not be surprising, therefore, to learn that when scientists go to work every morning, they assume that the events they are studying are not free but are determined by other events. This simply means that scientists assume all events have causes, even though they do not know what all the causes are in each case.”

Some Scientific Facts About Behavior as found in Reynolds's A Primer of Operant Conditioning (1968):

• Behavior is subject to the laws of nature.

• Behavior is the analysis of the relationship between behavior and the environment.

• One can study behavior directly and identify the cause and effect of the behavior observed.

• The determinants of behavior are to be found in the environment/culture in which one behaves.

• Behavior can be observed, measured, and reproduced.

• The frequency of a behavior is modified by its consequences that follow the behavior closely in time.

• As a scientific explanation of behavior, it specifies the actual environmental conditions and arrangements which reliably produce the behavior to be explained.

• It is deterministic.

• There are two kinds of environmental determinants of behavior: contemporary and historical.

• Behavior at any one moment is determined not only by the currently acting, contemporary environment, but also by the individual’s previous historical experience with these, or similar, environmental conditions.

• In humans, historical determinants of behavior are more difficult to specify. They invariably involve multiple experiences with different environments over a period of time. 

• Usually, a human person is not aware of the causes of their behavior.

• In research with non-human species, one can specify the historical determinants with precision, since they can be controlled during the developmental history, as well as the exact specifications of contemporary determinants.

• The laws of behavior that apply to non-humans apply also to humans.

• The study of private events and verbal behavior, unique to humans, is an important and relevant area of inquiry in the understanding and analysis of human behavior.

• Free Will is an illusion.

What will happen if we do nothing?

"Either we do nothing and allow a miserable and probably catastrophic future to overtake us, or we use our knowledge about human behavior to create a social environment in which we shall live productive and creative lives and do so without jeopardizing the chances that those who follow us will be able to do the same." B.F. Skinner (1976 preface) Walden Two.

Two more essays are coming to complete the Free Will series:

• How Private Events and Verbal Behavior Shape Your Beliefs and Expectations.

• Life without Free Will.

Pass it on and see you next week.

Francisco I. Perez, Ph.D.

Henry S, Pennypacker,Ph.D.

Faris R. Kronfli, Ph. D.