DETERMINISM OR FREE-WILL?

Printed and Published by
THE PIONEER PRESS
(G. W. Foote & Co., Ltd.),
61 Farringdon Street, London, E.C. 4.

Determinism
OR
Free-Will?

BY
CHAPMAN COHEN.

New Edition. Revised and Enlarged.

London:
THE PIONEER PRESS,
61 Farringdon Street, E.C. 4.

1919.

CONTENTS.

PREFACE TO NEW EDITION.

The demand for a new edition of Determinism or Free-Will is gratifying as affording evidence of the existence of a public, apart from the class catered for by more expensive publications, interested in philosophic questions[1]. It was, indeed, in the conviction that such a public existed that the book was written. Capacity, in spite of a popular impression to the contrary, has no very close relation to cash, nor is interest in philosophic questions indicated solely by the ability to spend a half-guinea or guinea on a work that might well have been published at three or four shillings. There exists a fairly large public of sufficient capacity and education intelligently to discuss the deeper aspects of life, but which has neither time nor patience to give to the study of bulky works that so often leave a subject more obscure at the end than it was at the beginning.

Nor does there appear any adequate reason why it should be otherwise. A sane philosophy must base itself on the common things of life, and must deal with the common experience of all men. The man who cannot find material for philosophic study by reflecting on those which are near at hand is not likely to achieve success by travelling all over the globe. He will only succeed in presenting to his readers a more elaborately acquired and a more expensively gained confusion. Nor is there any reason why philosophy should be discussed only in the jargon of the schools, except to keep it, like the religious mysteries, the property of the initiated few. We all talk philosophy, as we all talk prose, and doubtless many are as surprised as was M. Jourdain, when the fact is pointed out to them.

So whatever merit this little work has is chiefly due to the avoidance, so far as possible, of a stereotyped phraseology, and to the elimination of irrelevant matter that has gathered round the subject. The present writer has long had the conviction that the great need in the discussion of ethical and psychological questions is their restatement in the simplest possible terms. The most difficult thing that faces the newcomer to these questions is to find out what they are really all about. Writer follows writer, each apparently more concerned to discuss what others have said than to deal with a straightforward discussion of the subject itself. Imposing as this method may be, it is fatal to enlightenment. For the longer the discussion continues the farther away from the original question it seems to get. One has heard of "The Religion of Philosophy," and its acquisition of obscurity in thought and prolixity in language seems to have gone some distance towards earning the title.

Being neither anxious to parade the extent of my reading, nor greatly overawed by the large number of eminent men who have written on the subject, I decided that what was needed was a plain statement of the problem itself. My concern, therefore, has been to keep out all that has not a direct bearing on the essential question, and only to deal with other writers so far as a discussion of what they say may help to make plain the point at issue. If the result does not carry conviction it at least makes clear the ground of disagreement. And that is certainly something gained.

Moreover, there is a real need for a clearing away of all the verbal lumber that has been allowed to gather round subjects concerning which intelligent men and women will think even though they may be unable to reach reliable or satisfactory conclusions. And I have good grounds for believing that so far this little work has achieved the purpose for which it was written. If I may say it without being accused of conceit, it has made the subject clear to many who before found it incomprehensible. And, really, philosophy would not be so very obscure, if it were not for the philosophers. We may not always be able to find answers to our questions, but we ought always to understand what the questions are about. That it is not always the case is largely due to those who mistake obscurity for profundity, and in their haste to rise from the ground lose altogether their touch with the earth.

C. C.

DETERMINISM OR FREE-WILL?

I.
THE QUESTION STATED.

So much may be assumed without directly controverting or endorsing Professor Paulsen's opinion that the "Free-Will problem is one which arose under certain conditions and has disappeared with the disappearance of those conditions;" or the opposite opinion of Professor William James that there is no other subject on which an inventive genius has a better chance of breaking new ground. If mankind—even educated mankind—were composed of individuals whose brains functioned with the accuracy of the most approved text-books of logic, Professor Paulsen's opinion would be self-evidently true. Granting that the conditions which gave rise to the belief in Free-Will have disappeared, the belief itself should have disappeared likewise. Professor Paulsen's own case proves that he is either wrong in thinking that these conditions have disappeared, or in assuming that, this being the case, the belief has also died out.

The truth is that beliefs do not always, or even usually, die with the conditions that gave them birth. Society always has on hand a plentiful stock of beliefs that are, like so many intellectual vagrants, without visible means of support. Human history would not present the clash and conflict of opinion it does were it otherwise. Indeed, if a belief is in possession its ejection is the most difficult of all operations. Possession is here not merely nine points of the law, it is often all the law that is acknowledged. Beliefs once established acquire an independent vitality of their own, and may defy all destructive efforts for generations. One may, therefore, agree with the first half of Professor Paulsen's statement without endorsing the concluding portion. The problem has not, so far as the generality of civilized mankind is concerned, disappeared. The originating conditions have gone, but the belief remains, and its real nature and value can only be rightly estimated by a mental reconstruction of the conditions that gave it birth. As Spencer has reminded us, the pedigree of a belief is as important as is the pedigree of a horse. We cannot be really certain whether a belief is with us because of its social value, or because of sheer unreasoning conservatism, until we know something of its history. In any case we understand better both it and the human nature that gives it hospitality by knowing its ancestry. And of this truth no subject could better offer an illustration than the one under discussion.

Reserving this point for a moment, let us ask, "What is the essential issue between the believers in Free-Will and the upholders of the doctrine of Determinism?" One may put the Deterministic position in a few words. Essentially it is a thorough-going application of the principle of causation to human nature. What Copernicus and Kepler did for the world of astronomy, Determinism aims at doing for the world of psychological phenomena. Human nature, it asserts, is part and parcel of nature as a whole, and bears to it the same relation that a part does to the whole. When the Determinist refers to the "Order of Nature" he includes all, and asserts that an accurate analysis of human nature will be found to exemplify the same principle of causation that is seen to obtain elsewhere. True, mental phenomena have laws of their own, as chemistry and biology have their own peculiar laws, but these are additional, not contradictory to other natural laws. Any exception to this is apparent, not real. Man's nature, physical, biological, psychological, and sociological, is to be studied as we study other natural phenomena, and the closer our study the clearer the recognition that its manifestations are dependent upon processes with which no one dreams of associating the conception of "freedom." Determinism asserts that if we knew the quality and inclination of all the forces bearing upon human nature, in the same way that we know the forces determining the motions of a planet, then the forecasting of conduct would become a mere problem in moral mathematics. That we cannot do this, nor may ever be able to do it, is due to the enormous and ever-changing complexity of the forces that determine conduct. But this ought not to blind us to the general truth of the principle involved. To some extent we do forecast human conduct; that we cannot always do so, or cannot do so completely, only proves weakness or ignorance. The Determinist claims, therefore, that his view of human nature is thoroughly scientific, and that he is only applying here principles that have borne such excellent fruit elsewhere; and, finally, that unless this view of human nature be accepted the scientific cultivation of character becomes an impossibility.

So far the Determinist. The believer in Free-Will—for the future it will be briefer and more convenient to use the term "Volitionist" or "Indeterminist"—does not on his part deny the influence on the human organism of those forces on which the Determinist lays stress. What he denies is that any of them singly, or all of them collectively, can ever furnish an adequate and exhaustive account of human action. He affirms that after analysis has done its utmost there remains an unexplained residuum beyond the reach of the instruments or the methods of positive science. He denies that conduct—even theoretically—admits of explanation and prediction in the same way that explanation and prediction apply to natural phenomena as a whole. It is admitted that circumstances may influence conduct, but only in the way that a cheque for five pounds enables one to become possessed of a certain quantity of bullion—provided the cheque is honoured by the bank. So the "Will" may honour or respond to certain circumstances or it may not. In other words, the deterministic influence of circumstances is contingent, not necessary. Circumstances determine conduct only when a "free" volition assents to their operation. So against the proposition that conduct is ultimately the conditioned expression of one aspect of the cosmic order, there is the counter-proposition that intentional action is the unconditioned expression of absolutely free beings, and is what it is because of the selective action of an undetermined will.

Further, against all deterministic analysis the Volitionist stubbornly opposes the testimony of consciousness, and the necessity for the belief in Free-Will as a moral postulate. Thus, even when the deterministic analysis of an action—from its source in some external stimuli, to the final neural discharge that secures its performance is complete, it is still urged that no possible analysis can override man's conviction of "freedom." The existence of this conviction is, of course, indisputable, and it forms the bed-rock of all forms of anti-determinism. But the scientific or logical value of a conviction, as such, is surely open to question. Equally strong convictions were once held concerning the flatness of the earth's surface, the existence of witches, and a hundred and one other matters. Besides, a belief or a conviction is not a basal fact in human nature, it is the last stage of a process, and can therefore prove nothing save the fact of its own existence. Human nature at any stage of its existence is an evolution from past human nature, and many prevalent beliefs are as reminiscent in their character as our rudimentary tails are reminiscent of a simian ancestry. I hope later to make it clear that the much talked of testimony of consciousness is quite irrelevant to the question at issue; and also that the assumed necessity for the conception of "freedom" as a moral postulate is really due to a misconception of both the nature of morality and of voluntary action.

Ultimately the question, as already indicated, resolves itself into one of how far we are justified in applying the principle of causation. The Determinist denies any limit to its theoretical application. The Volitionist insists on placing man in a distinct and unique category. But this conception of causation is in itself of the nature of a growth, and a study of its development may well throw light on the present question.

A conception of causation in some form or other could hardly have been altogether absent from the most primitive races of mankind. Some experiences are so uniform, so persistent, and so universal that they would inevitably be connected in terms of cause and effect. Nevertheless, the primitive mind was so dominated by volitional conception of nature that a sense of necessary connection between events could only have been of a weak character. Experience may have shown that certain physical phenomena succeeded each other in a certain order, but the belief that these phenomena embodied the action of supernormal conscious forces would break in upon that sense of inevitability which is the very essence of scientific causation. Modern thought fixes its attention upon a given series of events and declines to go further. With us the order is inevitable. With primitive man the order, even when perceived, is conditional upon the non-interference of assumed supernormal intelligences. Each phenomenon, or each group of phenomena, thus possesses to the primitive mind precisely that quality of "freedom" which is now claimed for the human will.

How difficult is the task of establishing causal connections between physical phenomena the whole history of science bears witness. To establish causal connections between external conditions and subjective states, where the forces are more numerous and immensely more complex in their combinations, is a task of infinitely greater difficulty. Amongst savages it would never be attempted. Feelings arise without any traceable connection with surrounding conditions, nor does a recurrence of the same external circumstances produce exactly the same result. A circumstance that produces anger one day may give rise to laughter on another occasion. Something that produces a striking effect on one person leaves another quite unaffected. Numerous feelings arise in consciousness that have all the superficial signs of being self-generated. The phenomena are too diverse in character, and the connections too complex and obscure, for uninstructed man to reach a deterministic conclusion. The conclusion is inevitable; man himself is the absolute cause of his own actions; he is veritably master of his own fate, subject only to the malign and magical influence of other extra-human personalities.

Primitive thinking about man is thus quite in line with primitive thinking about other things. In a way man's earliest philosophy of things is more coherent and more rigorously logical than that of modern times. The same principle is applied all round. All force is conceived as vital force; "souls" or "wills" govern all. The division between animate and inanimate things is of the vaguest possible character; that between man and animals can hardly be said to exist. Only very gradually do the distinctions between animate and inanimate, voluntary and involuntary actions, which are taken for granted by the modern mind, arise. And it is easy to conceive that in the growth of these distinctions, modes of thinking characteristic of primitive man, would linger longest in the always obscure field of psychology. Broadly, however, the growth of knowledge has consisted, as Huxley pointed out, in the substitution of a mechanical for a volitional interpretation of things. In one department after another purposeful action yields to inevitable causation. In physics, chemistry, geology, astronomy, and kindred sciences this process is now complete. The volitional interpretation still betrays a feeble vitality in biology; but even here the signs of an early demise are unmistakable. Its last stronghold is in psychology, and this because it is at once the newest of the sciences to be placed upon a positive basis, and also the most obscure in its ramifications. Yet there can be no reasonable doubt that the same principle which has been found to hold good in other directions will sooner or later be shown to obtain here also. Science is by its very nature progressive; and its progress is manifested by the degree to which phenomena hitherto unrelated are brought under constantly enlarging and more comprehensive generalisations. Men were once satisfied to explain the "wetness" of water as due to a spirit of "aquosity," the movement of the blood as due to a "certain spirit" dwelling in the veins and arteries. These were not statements of knowledge, but verbose confessions of ignorance. To this same class of belief belongs the "Free-Will" of the anti-determinist. It is the living representative of that immense family of souls and spirits with which early animistic thought peopled the universe. The surviving member of a once numerous family, it carries with it the promise of the same fate that has already overtaken its predecessors.

The origin of the belief in free-will once understood, the reasons for its perpetuation are not difficult to discover. First comes the obscurity of the processes underlying human action. This alone would secure a certain vitality for a belief that has always made the impossibility of explaining the origin, sequence, and relation of mental states its principal defence. Beyond offering as evidence the questionable affirmation of consciousness volitionists have been unanimous in resting their case upon their adversary's want of knowledge. And it is further characteristic that while holding to a theory on behalf of which not a single shred of positive evidence has ever been produced, they yet demand the most rigorous and the most complete demonstration of determinism before they will accept it as true; this despite the presumptive evidence in its favour arising from the fact of its harmony with our knowledge in other directions.

Secondly, the human mind does not at any time commence its philosophic speculations de novo. It necessarily builds upon the materials accumulated by previous generations; and usually retains the form in which previous thinking has been cast, even when the contents undergo marked modifications. Thus the ghost-soul of the savage, a veritable material copy of the body, by centuries of philosophizing gets refined into the distinct "spiritual" substance of the metaphysician. And this, not because the notion of a "soul" was derived from current knowledge or thinking, but because it was one of the inherited forms of thought to which philosophy had to accommodate itself. The result of this pressure of the past upon contemporary thinking is that a large proportion of mental activity is in each generation devoted to reconciling past theories of things with current knowledge. In our own time the number of volumes written to reconcile the theory of evolution with already existing religious views is a striking example of this phenomenon. And beyond the philosophic few there lies the mass of the people with whom an established opinion of any kind takes on something of a sacred character. Unfortunately, too, many writers work with an eye to the prejudices of this class, which prejudices are in turn strengthened by the tacit support of men of ability, or at least by their not openly controverting them. It is, however, of the greatest significance that since the opening of the modern scientific period, wherever qualified thinkers have deliberately based their conclusions upon contemporary knowledge the theory of determinism has been generally upheld.

A third cause of the persistence of the belief in "Free-Will" is its association with theology. For at least four centuries, whenever the discussion of the subject has assumed an acute form, it has been due to theological requirements rather than to ethical or psychological considerations. True, many other reasons have been advanced, but these have been little more than cloaks for the theological interest. Apart from theology there does not seem any valid reason why the principle of determinism should rouse more opposition in connection with human character than it does in connection with the course of physical nature. Or if it be pointed out that the establishment of the principle of universal causation, as applied to nature at large, was not established without opposition, then the reply is that here again it was the religious interest that dictated the opposition. It was felt that the reduction of all physical phenomena to a mechanical sequence was derogatory to the majesty of God, excluded the deity from his own universe, and generally weakened the force of religious beliefs. And, as a mere matter of historic fact, the establishment of the scientific conception of nature did have, with the bulk of mankind, precisely the consequences predicted. And when in the course of events theological considerations were banished from one department of science after another, it was only natural that theologians should fight with the greater tenacity to maintain a footing in the region of human nature.

Although the subject is in origin pre-Christian, it was in connection with Christian theology that it assumed an important place in European thinking. The development of monotheism gave the problem a sharper point and a deeper meaning. The issue here was a simple one. Given the belief in God as sole creator and governor of the world, and he may conceivably be related to mankind in one of two ways. Either he induces man to carry out his will by an appeal to human reason and emotion, or he has so arranged matters that certain events will inevitably come to pass at a certain time, human effort being one of the contributory agencies to that end. The first supposition leaves man "free"—at least in his relation to deity. The second leads straight to the Christian doctrine of predestination. Either supposition has, from the theological point of view, its disadvantages. The first leaves man free as against God, but it limits the power of deity by creating an autonomous force that may act contrary to the divine will. The second opens up the question of the divine wisdom and goodness, and by making God responsible for evil conflicts with the demands of the moral sense. Evil and goodness are made parts of the divine plan, and as man must fit in with the general pre-arranged scheme, personal merit and demerit disappear. These considerations explain why in the course of the Free-Will controversy official Christianity has ranged itself now on one side and now on the other. It has championed Determinism or Indeterminism as the occasion served its interest. To-day, owing to easily discoverable reasons, Christian writers are, in the main, markedly anti-deterministic.

The first clear statement of the Christian position, if we omit the Pauline teaching that we are all as clay in the hands of the potter, appears in the writings of Augustine. In opposition to the Pelagians, Augustine maintained a doctrine of absolute predestination. No room was allowed for human self-determination to anyone but the first man. Adam was created and endowed with free-will, and chose evil—a curious verification of Voltaire's definition of Free-Will as a capacity by means of which man gets himself damned. And as in Adam there were contained, potentially, all future generations, all are pre-destined to eternal damnation except such as are saved through the free gift of divine grace. This theory of Augustine's, carried to the point of asserting the damnation of infants, was modified in several respects by that great medieval Christian teacher, Thomas Aquinas, who held that while the will might be "free" from external restraint, it was determined by our reason, but was reinstated in full force by John Calvin. He denied that the goodness or badness of man had anything whatever to do with the bestowal or withholding of grace. God dooms men either to heaven or hell, for no other reason than that he chooses to do so. Most of the leading Protestants of the early Reformation period were strongly opposed to "free-will." For instance, Zwingli asserted that God was the "author, mover, and impeller to sin." Still more emphatic was Luther. The will of man he compared to a horse, "If mounted by God it wills and wends whithersoever God may will; if mounted by Satan it wills and wends whithersoever Satan may will; neither hath it any liberty of choice to which of the riders it shall run, or which it shall choose; but the riders themselves contend for its acquisition and possession." Among the most powerful essays ever written in defence of Determinism was Jonathan Edwards's, the famous Protestant divine, "Inquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions respecting that Freedom of Will which is supposed to be essential to moral agency, virtue and vice, reward and punishment, praise and blame," and to which I shall have occasion to refer later. Finally, the explicit declarations of the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Articles of the Church of England, that man's will,—in the absence of grace,—cannot accomplish good works, throw a curious light on the theological opponents of Determinism who denounce it as anti-Christian and immoral.

II.
"FREEDOM" AND "WILL."

To David Hume the dispute between the advocates of "Free-Will" and the advocates of "Necessity" was almost entirely a matter of words. The essence of the question, he thought, both sides were agreed on, and consequently expressed the opinion that "a few intelligible definitions would immediately have put an end to the whole controversy." That Hume was over sanguine is shown by the controversy being still with us. Yet his recommendation as to intelligible definitions, while pertinent to all controversy, is specially so with regard to such a subject as that of "Free-Will." For much of the anti-Determinist case actually rests upon giving a misleading significance to certain phrases, while applying others in a direction where they have no legitimate application. Consider, for instance, the controversial significance of such a phrase as "Liberty versus Necessity"—the older name for Determinism. We all love liberty, we all resent compulsion, and, as Mill pointed out, he who announces himself as a champion of Liberty has gained the sympathies of his hearers before he has commenced to argue his case. Such words play the same part that "catchy" election cries do in securing votes. Such phrases as "Power of Choice," "Sense of Responsibility," "Testimony of Consciousness," "Consciousness of Freedom," are all expressions that, while helpful and legitimate when used with due care and understanding, as usually employed serve only to confuse the issue and prevent comprehension.

Not that the dispute between the Volitionist and the Determinist is a merely verbal one. The controversy carries with it a significance of the deepest kind. Fundamentally the issue expresses the antagonism of two culture stages, an antagonism which finds expression in many other directions. We are in fact concerned with what Tylor well calls the deepest of all distinctions in human thought, the distinction that separates Animism from Materialism. Much as philosophic ingenuity may do in the way of inventing defences against the application of the principle of causation to human action, the deeper our analysis of the controversy, the more clearly is it seen that we are dealing with an attenuated form of that primitive animism which once characterised all human thinking. The persistence of types is a phenomenon that occurs as frequently in the world of mind as it does in the world of biology. Or just as when a country is overrun by a superior civilisation, primitive customs are found lingering in remote districts, so unscientific modes of thinking linger in relation to the more obscure mental processes in spite of the conquests of science in other directions.

It is well to bear these considerations in mind, even while admitting that a great deal of the dispute does turn upon the fitness of the language employed, and the accuracy with which it is used. And if intelligible definition may not, as Hume hoped, end the controversy, it will at least have the merit of making the issue plain.

What is it that people have in their minds when they speak of the "Freedom of the Will"? Curiously enough, the advocates of "free-will" seldom condescend to favour us with anything so commonplace as a definition, or if they do it tells us little. We are consequently compelled to dig out the meanings of their cardinal terms from the arguments used. Now the whole of the argument for "free-will" makes the word "free" or "freedom" the equivalent to an absence of determining conditions; either this, or the case for "free-will" is surrendered. For if a man's decisions are in any way influenced—"influenced" is here only another word for "determined"—Determinism is admitted. I need not argue whether decisions are wholly or partly determined, the real and only question being whether they are determined at all. What is called by some a limited free-will is really only another name for unlimited nonsense.

"Freedom," as used by the Volitionist, being an equivalent for "absence of determining conditions," let us ask next what this means. Here I am brought to a dead halt. I do not know what it means. I cannot even conceive it as meaning anything at all. At any rate, I am quite certain that it is outside the region of scientific thought and nomenclature. Scientifically, atoms of matter are not free to move in any direction, the planets are not free to move in any shaped orbit, the blood is not free to circulate, the muscles are not free to contract, the brain is not free to function. In all these cases what takes place is the result of all converging circumstances and conditions. Given these and the result follows. Scientifically, the thing that occurs is the only thing possible. If the word "free" is used in science, it is as a figure of speech, as when one speaks of a free gas, or of the blood not being free to circulate owing to the existence of a constricted artery. But in either case all that is meant is that a change in the nature of the conditions gives rise to a corresponding change of result. The determination of the gas or the blood to behave in a definite way is as great in any case. From the point of view of science, then, to speak of an absence of determining conditions is the most complete nonsense. All science is a search for the conditions that determine phenomena. Save as a metaphor, "freedom" has no place whatever in positive science.

Are we then to discard the use of such a word as "freedom" altogether? By no means. Properly applied, the word is intelligible and useful enough. When, for instance, we speak of a free man, a free state, a free country, or free trade, we are using the word "free" in a legitimate manner, and can give to it a precise significance. A free state is one in which the people composing it pursue their way uncoerced by other states. A free man is one who is at liberty to exert bodily action or express his opinions. We do not mean that in the first instance the people are not governed by laws, or that physical conditions are without influence on them; nor do we mean, in the second instance, that the actions and opinions of the free man are not the result of heredity, bodily structure, education, social position, etc. The obvious meaning of "freedom" in each of these cases is an absence of external and non-essential coercion. It does not touch the question of why we act as we do, or of why we please to act in this or that manner. As Jonathan Edwards puts it: "The plain, obvious meaning of the words 'freedom' and 'liberty' is power and opportunity, or advantage that any one has to do as he pleases." Or as Hume put it more elaborately:—

"What is meant by liberty when applied to voluntary actions? We cannot surely mean that actions have so little connection with motives, inclinations, and circumstances that one does not follow with a certain degree of uniformity from the other. For these are plain and acknowledged matters of fact. By liberty, then, we can only mean a power of acting or not acting, according to the determination of the will—that is, if we choose to remain at rest we may; and if we choose to move, we also may."

The ultimate significance of "liberty" or "freedom" is thus sociological. Here it expresses a fact; in positive science it is a mere metaphor, and, as experience shows, a misleading one. Its use in philosophy dates from the time of the Greeks, and when they spoke of a free man they were borrowing an illustration from their social life. There were slaves and there were free men, and in speaking of a free man people were not so likely as they were at a later date to be misled by a metaphor. Unfortunately, its use in philosophy has continued, while its limitations have been ignored. To ask if a man is free is an intelligible question. To ask whether actions are free from the determining associations of organization and environment admits of but one intelligible reply. Personally, I agree with Professor Bain that the term "is brought in by main force, into a phenomenon to which it is altogether incommensurable," and it would be well if it could be excluded altogether from serious discussion[2].

Now let us take that equally confusing word "will." Unfortunately, few of those who champion the freedom of the will think it worth while to trouble their readers with a clear definition of what they mean by it. The orthodox definition of the will as "a faculty of the soul" tells us nothing. It is explaining something the existence of which is questioned by reference to something else the existence of which is unknown. Or the definition is volunteered, "Will is the power to decide," a description which only tells us that to will is to will. Professor James tells us that "Desire, wish, will, are states of mind which every one knows, and which no definition can make plainer." This may be true of desire and wish; it certainly is not true of "will." There is no question as to "will" being a state of mind, but as to every one knowing its character, and above all possessing the knowledge enabling him to discriminate between "will" and "desire" and "wish," this is highly questionable. One may also be permitted the opinion that if advocates of "free-will" were to seriously set themselves the task of discovering what they do mean by "will," and also in what way it may be differentiated from other mental states, the number of the champions of that curious doctrine would rapidly diminish.

What is it that constitutes an act of volition, or supplies us with the fact of will? The larger part of our bodily movements do not come under the heading of volition at all. The primary bodily movements are reflex, instinctive, emotional, the action following without any interposition of consciousness. Of course, an action that is performed quite automatically at one time may be voluntarily performed at another time. I may close my eyelid deliberately, or it may be because of the approach of some foreign object. Or an action, if it be performed frequently, tends to become automatic. To come within the category of a voluntary action, it must be performed consciously, and there is also present some consciousness of an end to be realized. Every voluntary action is thus really dependent upon memory. A newly-born child has no volitions, only reflexes. It is only when experience has supplied us with an idea of what may be done that we will it shall be done. This consideration alone is enough to shatter the case for the supposed freedom of the will.[3]

If we analyze any simple act of volition what has just been said will be made quite clear. I am sitting in a room and will to open a window; it may be to get fresh air, to look out, or for some other reason. Assume that the first is the correct reason, the room being close and "stuffy." First of all, then, I become aware of a more or less unpleasant feeling; my experience tells me this is because the air in the room needs purifying. Experience also tells me that by opening a window the desired result will be obtained. Finally, I open the window and experience a feeling of relief and satisfaction. Now had the room been without a window, and the door bolted from the outside, or had the window been too heavy for me to raise, no "volition" would have arisen. I should still have had the desire for fresh air, but not seeing any means by which this could be obtained, I should have had no motive for action, and should have remained perfectly passive. In order that my desire may operate as a motive there must be not only a consciousness of a need, but also a mental representation of the means by which that need is to be gratified. I will to do a thing, when allied to the desire for that thing there is a conception of how it is to be done, of the means to be employed. Without this I have no motive, only a desire; without a consciousness of the nature of the desire, there is nothing but pure feeling. "Willing terminates with the prevalence of the idea...." "Attention with effort is all that any case of volition implies." (Prof. W. James, Princip. of Psychology, II. 560-1.)

The stages of the process are, feeling rising into consciousness as desire, the perception of the means to realize an end which raises the desire from the statical to the dynamic stage of motive, and finally a voluntary or intentional action. Now at no stage of this process is there room for the intervention of any power or faculty not expressed in a strictly sequential process. Of course, the action I have taken as an example is an exceedingly simple one, but the more complex actions only offer greater difficulties of analysis without leading to any different result. This will be seen more clearly when we come to deal with "choice" and "deliberation." From the moment that a certain stimulus creates a desire in an organism, to the time that desire expresses itself in action, there is no gap in the chain through which a "Free-Will" may manifest its being. The physiologist points out that at the basis of all our feelings and ideas there lie certain neural processes. The psychologist takes up the story and from the dawn of desire to action finds no break—or at least none that future knowledge may not reasonably hope to make good. Want of knowledge may at present prevent our tracing all the details of the process, but this is surely a very inadequate ground on which to affirm the existence of a power at variance with our knowledge of nature in other directions.[4]

Now in thus tracing the course of a voluntary action are we doing any more than observing the action of desire in consciousness? If, yes, the writer is quite unaware of the fact. If I remove all feeling, all desire, all motive, "the will" disappears. Excite feeling, generate desire, and there is the occasion for a voluntary action. Multiply the number of desires and the operation of "will" becomes evident. Thus when a writer like Professor Hyslop says, "If two motives offer different attractions to the will," the reply is that the "will" is not one thing, and motives other things, but two aspects of one fact. The "will" is not something that decides or chooses between motives; the "will" is nothing more than the name given to that motive or cluster of motives which is sufficiently strong to overcome resistance and to express itself in action. I emphasize the expression "overcome resistance" because without competing motives and a sense of resistance we have no clear consciousness of volition. Where only one desire is present in consciousness, or where it is of overwhelming strength, feeling is succeeded by action without any recognizable hiatus. It is the sense of conflict, the break, that is essential to creating a lively sense of volition, and also, as shall see later, to the sense of choice and deliberation. But in speaking of an action as the expression of motives, or as an expression of "will," both statements are identical so far as the fact is concerned. We have not desires, motives, and "will," there is simply a desire or desires that assume the quality of a motive by being strong enough to result in action. As Spencer has put it, "Will is no more an existence apart from the predominant feeling than a king is an existence apart from the man occupying the throne."

All that is to be found in any act of "will" is a desire accompanied by the consciousness of an end. To put the same thing in another way, we have a desire, the consciousness of an end and the means of realizing it, and, finally, action. To the physiological and psychological processes that culminate in action we give the name of motive. Properly speaking a motive that does not issue in action—or inhibition—is not a motive at all, it is a mere desire. And apart from the presence of desire, or of desires, "will" does not exist. It is a pure abstraction, valuable enough as an abstraction, but having no more real existence apart from particular motives, than "tree" is a real existence apart from particular trees. Physiologically, says Dr. Maudsley:—

"We cannot choose but reject the will.... As physiologists we have to deal with volition as a function of the supreme centres, following reflection, varying in quantity and quality as its cause varies, strengthened by education and exercise, enfeebled by disuse, decaying with decay of structure.... We have to deal with will not as a single undecomposable faculty unaffected by bodily conditions, but as a result of organic changes in the supreme centres, affected as certainly and as seriously by disorders of them as our motor faculties are by disorders of their centres."

And, says Professor Sully, referring to the will:—

"Modern scientific psychology knows nothing of such an entity. As a science of phenomena and their laws, it confines itself to a consideration of the processes of volition, and wholly discards the hypothesis of a substantial will as unnecessary and unscientific."

Neither physiology nor psychology, neither a sane science nor a sound philosophy, knows anything of, or can find use for, an autonomous "will." "Will" as the final term of a discoverable series may be admitted; "will" as a self-directing force, deciding whether particular desires shall or shall not prevail, answers to nothing conformable to our knowledge of man, and is plainly but the ghost of the wills and souls of our savage ancestors. If instead of speaking of the freedom of the will, we spoke of uncaused volitions, the position of the volitionist would be clear, and its indefensible character plain to all. But by giving the abstraction "will" a concrete existence, and by taking from sociology a word such as "freedom" and using it in a sphere in which it has no legitimate application, the issue is confused, and a scientifically absurd theory given an air of plausibility. The dispute between the Determinist and the Indeterminist is certainly not one of words only, but it is one in which the cardinal terms employed need the most careful examination if we are to clear away from the subject the verbal fog created by theologians and metaphysicians.

III.
CONSCIOUSNESS, DELIBERATION, AND CHOICE.

The question is, What does consciousness really tell us, and how far is its testimony valid? In some directions it must be admitted that the testimony of consciousness is absolute. In others it cannot, without verification, claim any authority whatever. When I say that I have a feeling of heat or coldness, of pleasure or pain, there is here a direct deliverance of consciousness against which there is no appeal. But consciousness does not and cannot tell me why I feel hot or cold, or what is the cause of a pain I am experiencing. In this last case the testimony of consciousness may be distinctly misleading. As it tells us nothing of the existence of a brain, a nervous system, viscera, etc., its testimony as to the cause of pain is obviously of no value. We are conscious of states of mind, and that is all. A man seized with sudden paralysis may be conscious of his power to move a limb, only to discover by experience his impotence. In short, consciousness cannot, indeed does not, tell us the causes of our states of mind. For this information we are thrown back upon observation, experiment, and experience. We must, then, make quite sure when we interrogate consciousness, exactly what it is that consciousness says, and whether what it says is on a subject that comes within its province.

What is, then, the testimony of consciousness? When it is said that we are conscious of our ability to have selected one alternative at the time that another is chosen, I think this may be fairly met with the retort that consciousness is unable to inform us as to our actual ability to do anything at all. I may be quite conscious of a desire to jump a six foot fence, or lift a weight of half a ton, but whether I am actually able to do so or not, only experience can decide. What I am really conscious of is a desire to vault a given height or lift a given weight, and it is surely an inexcusable confusion to speak of a desire to do a particular thing as the equivalent of an ability to do it. If a consciousness of desire equalled the ability to perform failure would be but little known among men.

All that consciousness really tells us is of the existence of passing states of mind. It can tell us nothing of their origin, their value, or their consequences. In the particular instance under consideration consciousness informs us of the fact of choice, and this no Determinist has ever dreamed of denying. He does assert that choice, as the Indeterminist persists in using the term, is a delusion, but otherwise, as will be shown later, he claims that it is only on deterministic lines that choice can have any meaning or ethical significance. In any voluntary action I am conscious of the possibility of choice and of having chosen, and that is really all. What is the nature of that possibility, and why I choose one thing rather than another—on these points consciousness can give us no information whatever. One might as reasonably argue that a consciousness of hunger gives us a knowledge of the process of digestion, as argue that a consciousness of choice supplies us with a knowledge of the mechanism of the process. We are conscious of the presence of several desires, we are also conscious that out of these several desires one is strong enough to rank as a motive, but it tells us absolutely nothing of the causes or conditions that have resulted in the emergence of that motive. Instead of telling us that we could have acted in opposition to the strongest motive—which is really the indeterminist position—consciousness simply reveals which desire is the most powerful. We are conscious that other desires were present, we are also aware of the possibility that another desire than the one that actually prevailed might have been the most powerful; but when we admit this and say that we could have acted differently, we have really displaced the actual conditions by imaginary ones. We might have preferred to act differently. This is not denied. It is not questioned that we do choose, or that the same person chooses, differently or different occasions. The question really is, Why have we chosen thus or thus? And so far as consciousness is concerned we are quite in the dark as to why one choice is made rather than another, what are the conditions that give rise to our conscious desires, or why one desire is more powerful than another.

Consciousness, then, can testify only to the reality of its own states; no more. It can tell us nothing of their causes. It cannot tell us that man has a brain and nervous system, and can tell us nothing of the connection between mental states and the condition of the bodily organs. The chief factor in conduct (habit) lies outside the region of consciousness altogether. In most cases we act as we have been in the habit of acting, and our present conduct expresses the sum of our previous actions and inclinations. Every action we perform assists the formation of a habit, and with every repetition of a particular action we find its performance easier. Indeed, a very powerful criticism of the trustworthiness of consciousness is found in the fact that the determining causes of conduct lie largely in the region of the unconscious or subconscious, and of this territory consciousness can tell us no more than a ripple on the surface of a river can tell us of its depths.

Next to the emphasis upon the testimony of consciousness the Indeterminist lays special stress upon the facts of choice and deliberation. Can we really say, it is asked, that man chooses and deliberates, or even that in any genuine sense he does anything at all, if all his actions are pre-determined by his constitution and environment? If every act of man is determined and man himself a mere stage in the process unending and unbroken, is it not idle to speak of man deliberating on alternatives and choosing that which seems to him best? We continue using words that on deterministic lines have lost all meaning. And if Determinists do not realise this, it is because the logical implications of their doctrines have never been fully explored.

Well, it entirely depends upon the sense in which one uses the cardinal terms in the discussion. If deliberation and choice when applied to mental processes are used in the same sense as when these terms are used as descriptive of the proceedings of a committee, then we can all agree that deliberation would be as great a sham as it would be if the members of a committee before meeting had determined upon their decision. But, we may note in passing, that even here, when the deliberations are genuine, the votes of each member are supposed to be decided by the reasons advanced during the discussion—that is the decision of each individual member is determined by the forces evoked during the deliberations.

The scientific method, and it may be added, the sane and profitable method, is not to come to the study of a problem with ready-made meanings and compel the facts, under penalty of disqualification, to agree with them, but to let the facts determine what meaning is to be attached to the words used. It is mere childish petulance for the Indeterminist to say that unless certain words are used with his meaning they shall not be used at all, but shall be expelled from our vocabulary. When gravity was conceived as a force moving downward through infinite space, the existence of people on the other side of the earth was denied as being contrary to the law of gravitation. A more correct knowledge of the phenomena did not lead people to discard gravity; the meaning of the word was revised. And really neither language nor morality is the private property of the Indeterminist, and he is, therefore, not at liberty to annihilate either for not coming up to his expectations. He must submit to such revision of his ideas, or his language, or of both, as more accurate knowledge may demand.

The question is not, then, whether Determinism destroys deliberation and choice and responsibility, but what meaning Determinism can legitimately place upon these words, and is this meaning in harmony with what we know to be true. With responsibility we will deal at length later. For the present let us see what is really involved in the fact of choice. Determinism, we are advised, must deny the reality of choice, because choice assumes alternatives, and there can be no genuine alternatives if events are determined. Let us see. If I am watching a stone rolling down a hillside, and am in doubt as to whether it will pass to the right or to the left of a given point, I shall not recognize any resident capacity in the stone for choosing one path rather than the other. The absence of consciousness in the stone precludes such an assumption. But suppose we substitute for the stone a barefooted human being, and assume that one path is smooth while the other is liberally sprinkled with sharp pointed stones. There would then be an obvious reason for the selection of one path, and no one would hesitate to say that here was an illustration of the exercise of choice. Choice, then, is a phenomenon of consciousness, and it implies a recognition of alternatives. But a recognition of alternatives does not by any means imply that either of two are equally eligible. It is merely a consciousness of the fact that they exist, and that either might be selected were circumstances favourable to its selection. Without labouring the point we may safely say that all that is given in the fact of choice is the consciousness of a choice. There is nothing in it that tells us of the conditions of the selection, or whether it was possible for the agent to have chosen differently or not.

So far there is nothing in Determinism that is discordant with the fact of choice, indeed, it has a perfectly reasonable theory of the process. Why is there a choice or selection of things or actions? Clearly the reason must be looked for in the nature of the thing selected, or in the nature of the agent that selects, or in a combination of both factors. Either there is an organic prompting in favour of the thing selected, as when a baby takes a bottle of milk and rejects a bottle of vinegar, or there is a recognition that the selection will enable the agent to better realize whatever end he has in view. The alternatives are there, and they are real in the only sense in which they can be real. But they are not real in the sense of their being equally eligible—which is the sense in which the Indeterminist uses the word. For that would destroy choice altogether. Unless a selection is made because certain things offer greater attractions than other things to the agent, no intelligible meaning can be attached to such a word as "Choice." We should have a mere blind explosion of energy, the direction taken no more involving choice than the stone's path down a hillside. And if the "Will" chooses between alternatives because one is more desirable than the other, its "freedom" (in the Indeterminist sense) is sacrificed, and the selection is correspondingly determined. There can be no real choice in the absence of a determinative influence exercised by one of the things chosen.

But it is urged that this line of reasoning does not explain the feeling of possibility that we have at the moment of action. I think it explains possibility as it explains choice, provided we allow facts to determine the meaning of words instead of torturing facts to suit certain forms of language. If by possibility we mean that under identical conditions, other things than those which actually occur are possible, then this may be confidently met with a flat denial. If, on the other hand, it is meant that by varying the conditions other possibilities become actualities, this is a statement that to a Determinist is self-evident. As a matter of fact, there are only two senses in which the word "possibility" may be rightly used, and neither sense yields any evidence against Determinism.

One of these meanings is simply an expression of our own ignorance on the matter that happens to be before us. If I am asked what kind of weather we are likely to have a month hence, I should reply that it is equally possible the day may be dry or wet, bright or dull. I do not mean to imply that had I adequate knowledge it would not be as easy to predict the kind of weather on that date as it is to predict the position of Neptune. It is simply an expression of my own ignorance. But, as Spinoza pointed out, possibility narrows as knowledge grows. To complete ignorance anything is possible because the course of events is unknown. As a comprehension of natural causation develops, people speak less of what may possibly occur, and more of what will occur. Possibility here has no reference to the course of events, only to our knowledge, or want of knowledge, concerning their order. To say that it is possible for a man to do either this or that is, so far as a spectator is concerned, only to say that our knowledge concerning the man's whole nature is not extensive enough, or exact enough for us to predict what he will do. Nor is the case altered if instead of an outsider, it is the agent himself who is incapable of prediction. For all that amounts to is the assertion that the agent is ignorant of the relative strength of desires that may be aroused under a particular conjuncture of circumstances.

The second sense of "possibility" depends upon our ability to imagine conditions not actually present at the moment of action. By a trick of imagination I can picture myself acting differently, or, on looking back, I can see that I might have acted differently. But in either case I have altered in thought the conditions that actually existed at the moment of action. Generally, all it means is that with a number of conflicting desires present, I am conscious that a very slight variation in the relative strength of these desires would result in a different course of conduct. And the conditions affecting conduct are so complex and so easily varied that it is small wonder there is lacking in this instance that sense of inevitability present when one is dealing with physical processes. But the essential question is not whether a slight change of conditions would produce a different result, but whether under identical conditions two opposite courses of action are equally possible? And this is not only untrue in fact, it is unthinkable, as a formal proposition. Even the old adage, "There, but for the grace of God, go I," while recognizing a different possibility, also recognized that a variation in the factors—the elimination of the grace of God—is essential if the possibility was to become an actuality. That the sense of possibility implies more than this may be safely denied, let who will make the opposite affirmation.

This discussion of the nature and function of choice will help us to realize more clearly than would otherwise be the case the nature of deliberation. This question has always played an important part in the Free-Will controversy, because it has stood as the very antithesis of a reflex or obviously mechanical action. Deliberation, it has been argued, does very clearly point to a determinative power exercised by the human will, and a power that cannot be explained in the same terms with which we explain other events. One anti-determinist writer remarks that "if a volition is the effect of a 'motive,' it should follow immediately upon the occurrence of the motive. But if there is deliberation between motives, they do not seem to have casual power to initiate a volition until a prior causal power directs them, and this would be the deliberating subject."

Now there are numerous cases, the majority probably, where action does follow immediately upon the presence of desire. And in such cases we are not aware of any process of deliberation, although there may be a truly intentional action. And from this single case we have a whole series of examples that will take us to the other extreme where the desires are so numerous and so conflicting that an excess of deliberation may prevent action altogether. Let us take an illustration. Sitting in my room on a fine day I am conscious of a desire for a walk. Provided no opposing feeling or desire is present I should at once rise and go out. But I may be conscious of a number of other feelings based upon various considerations. There is the fact of leaving the task on which I am engaged, and the desire to get it finished. There is the trouble of dressing, the consideration that once out I may wish I had stayed in, or that it may rain, or that I may be needed at home: all these result in a state of indecision, and induce deliberation. Imagination is excited, ideal feelings are aroused, and eventually a choice is made. I decide on the walk. What is it, now, that has occurred? My first desire for a walk has been enforced by a representation of all the advantages that may be gained by going out, and these have proved themselves strong enough to bear down all opposition. Had any other desire gained strength, or had the conviction that it would rain been strong enough, a different motive would have emerged from this conflict of desires and ideas. No matter how we vary the circumstances, this is substantially what occurs in every case where deliberation and choice are involved. Not only is this what does occur, but it is impossible to picture clearly any other process. The only evidence we can have of the relative strength of ideas is that one triumphs over others. To say that the weaker desire triumphs is to make a statement the absurdity of which is self-evident.

This conclusion cannot be invalidated by the argument that a particular desire becomes the stronger because the "will" declares in its favour. One need only ask, by way of reply, Why does the "will" declare in favour of one desire rather than another? There is no dispute that a choice is made. Those who say that a man can choose what he likes are not making a statement that conflicts in the slightest degree with Determinism. The Determinist says as clearly as anyone that I do what I choose to do. The real question is why do I choose this rather than that? Why does the "will" pronounce in favour of one desire rather than another? No one can believe that all desires are of equal strength or value to the agent. Such an assumption would be too absurd for serious argument. But if all desires are not of equal strength and value, the only conclusion left is that certain ones operate because they are, in relation to the particular organism, of greater value than others. And in that case we are simply restating Determinism. The action of the environment is conditioned by the nature of the organism. The reaction of the organism is conditioned by the character of the environment. The resultant is a compound of the two.

It is, moreover, an absurdity to speak of the "will" or the self as though this were something apart from the various phases of consciousness. In the contest of feelings and desires that calls forth deliberation I am equally involved in every aspect of the process. As Professor James points out, "both effort and resistance are ours, and the identification of our self with one of these factors is an illusion and a trick of speech." My self and my mental states are not two distinct things; they constitute myself, and if these are eliminated there is no self left to talk about.

Further, in the growth of each individual, conscious and deliberative action can be seen developing out of automatic action—the simplest and earliest type of action. Not only does deliberative action develop from reflex action, but it sinks into reflex action again. One of the commonest of experiences is that actions performed at one time slowly and after deliberation are at another time performed rapidly and automatically. Every action contributes to the formation of a habit, and frequently repetition results in the habit becoming a personal characteristic. Deliberation and choice are not even always the mark of a highly developed character; they may denote a poorly-developed one—one that is ill adapted to social requirements. One man, on going into a room where there is a purse of money, may only after long deliberation and from conscious choice refrain from stealing it. Another person, under the same conditions, may be conscious of no choice, no effort, the desire to steal the purse being one that is foreign to his nature. In two such by no means uncommon instances, we should have no doubt as to which represented the higher type of character. Morally, it is not the feeling, "I could have acted dishonestly instead of honestly had I so chosen," that marks the ethically developed character, but the performance of the right action at the right moment, without a consciousness of tendency in the opposite direction. But the aim of education is, in the one direction, to weaken the sense of choice by the formation of right habits, moral and intellectual; and on the other hand by bringing man into a more direct contact with a wider and more complex environment, deliberation becomes one of the conditions of a co-ordination of ideas and actions that will result in a more perfect adaptation.