[Ailist] PsyBlog: Do You Believe in Free Will?

[Bruce Elkin]

> 
> http://www.spring.org.uk/2009/01/do-you-believe-in-free-will.php

Interesting article, Stephanie. I like the ³compatabilism² approach, toward
the end.

But the underlying question poses a false dichotomy, what EF Schumacher
called a ³divergent challenge.²
The more you frame the question and try to solve it, the more the
³solutions² diverge from each other. Ultimately you end up with polar
opposites, such as free will vs. determinism.

Schumacher said that you have to transcend the question by going to a higher
level value.  He gave the example of the French revolutionary slogan,
³Liberté, Egalité, et Fraternité² as an example. If you have unlimited
freedom, society won¹t be very equal. To get it completely equal, you have
to regulate freedom too much. So the French went to the higher order value
of compassion (brotherlineness/ fraternite), to help reconcile the dichotomy
between freedom and equality.

In my new (soon to be finished) ebook Staying Up In Down Times: Resilience,
Results, and Rewards, I discuss this issue and Schumacher¹s approach to it.
In it, I say:

> Schumacher¹s pairs of opposites ³cease to be opposites,² he says, ³at the
> higher level, the really human level, where self-awareness plays its proper
> role.² At the level of the whole person, higher, more senior forces such as
> love, compassion, truth, understanding, and creativity enable us to embrace
> and transcend these polar opposites.

As usual, I¹m trying to make a case for a shift from a predominantly
³problem² focused approach to the higher-level ³creating² approach (which I
suggest is very compatible with the AI approach).  I add:

> Creating is more powerful‹and simpler‹than problem solving because it
> mobilizes such forces as caring, and love. Working within creative tension, we
> can transcend problems, and create what truly matters to us.
> 
> The Urge to Create
> The great psychologist Carl Jung recognized the wisdom in transcending
> divergent challenges when he said that life¹s messy problems are not solved,
> only outgrown. As we saw earlier, they fade away when confronted with a new
> and stronger life urge such as the urge to create.
> 
> Creating is driven by the power of love‹the desire to bring an envisioned
> result into being. It is rooted in the truth the current state of the result.
> It expresses our creative spirit through choices and action. It is the place,
> where the hands, the head, and the heart come together.

So, to come back to the free will vs. determinism dichotomy, I think it,
too, can be transcended by creating.
Our choices are not merely determined, only partially. Much choice is freely
chosen, in support of higher order values and visions. It¹s not so much a
³both/and² balance, but more a hierarchy of choice in which we acknowledge
the degree to which our past and our biology determine us, and we transcend
that determinism through higher order choices and actions in support of what
we want to create.

Of course, unless we understand and master the ³creating² approach and it¹s
structure, we¹re doomed (determined) to flail away at things with our
problem solving hammers.

Cheers!
Bruce
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BRUCE ELKIN: Helping You Create What Matters Most!
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