Science and the question of free will

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There exists a condition that presents in a way similar to Aspergers, but the cause is either a complete lack of, or an incomplete formation of, the corpus callosum-- a strip of brain tissue that allows for communication between the two halves of the brain. There are also cases of severe eplipsy in which a treatment can be the surgical severing of this bridge--it prevents the seizures from spreading from one half of the brain to the other.

The results of this intentional severing of a person born with two united brain halves can be interesting, to say the least. They now have essentially two brains able to think and function independently. I have read that this can cause, for example, such a person to attempt to put on a pair of pants with one hand while at the same time trying to take them off with the other, because one half of the brain decided on the first and the other on the second.

This got me thinking about the question of free will. Because in the split brain patient above mentioned, that person does not seem to really have "decided" to do anything. They have two independent brains, and one decided on one thing, and the other decided to do the exact opposite. Where is free will in this? It seems the persons actions are really in fact determined not by their soul, consciousness, or whatever you want to call it, but by the synaptic activities of their brains, which are out of "their" control, if you follow what I'm trying to say.

Hmm, but in your example you say that the halve of the brain have independent decision making capability... and thus it sounds to me more like dually free will. The free will of each half has made a decision that the body then acts on. No?

It's just that almost every human has only one singularly acting brain with which they make decisions. In the instance described above, perhaps it's one of those "on the fence," decisions where one could either get dressed and be warmer, or undressed and be cooler, but they're not quite sure which.. this happens every evening at the beach when the Sun starts to set, goes behind a cloud, or the wind begins to blow and you're like "hmmmm, not sure if I wanna stay naked or get dressed.." and I could see how both decisions could be made if your brain is behaving like two different brains.

What I'm driving at here is what is making the decision in the first place? Is it "you" in the sense of "you" as a distinct entity, soul, whatever? Evidently not. Its a biological organ, and these decisions are made by neurons resulting in actions out of "your" control. I think the example of the split brain patient illustrated that pretty well. They have two decision making organs, and each can decide on the exact opposite course of action from the other! "You" have no control over the electrochemical and possible quantum mechanical whatevers going on within and between "your" nerve cells that actually result in these actions and decisions! Those electrochemical connections are in fact what make "you" "you". Perhaps that's confusing, I'm really struggling with this.

Another example--dissociative disorder, or what they used to call split personality disorder. I've read case studies on this and its fascinating. In some people, a priest and a serial killer can co exist in the same skull. In others, some of the alternate personalities can be of the other gender (as in male body but a totally female personality and vice versa), other sexual orientation, etc, etc, the list goes on. There are even some personalities that exhibit, for example, the symptoms of physical illnesses like diabetes, which are not shared by the other personalities! How is this even possible? Each of these "people" must be the result of separate neural wiring, a consequence of electrochemistry outside of the control of each.

Perhaps by free will you mean consiousness?
I think that much of what is written about the split-brain is click-baity exaggeration
Anyways, here's an interesting article! https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2 ... 093823.htm

Last edited by Spyoon on 10 May 2018, 1:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I need to get a copy of this paper...

As for consciousness, no I don't think that's what I mean. Animals have consciousness, at least some do to some degree. I mean volition, I mean decision making. I'm struggling with WHY we decide to do what we do and HOW this is accomplished.

Another thing--I don't have a predetermined conclusion here. I don't desire this to be one way or the other. I'd welcome whatever thoughts and evidence anyone here can post in my pondering of this.

You can get it ,here;
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... sciousness

Yeah, noone can conclude anything for sure , from that little data...But it is a compeling topic to think about , even though the butchery past of neurology makes me sad .

*shrug* I dunno. I know that I DO consciously make decisions based on criteria that I set for myself, though, so it's not as if everything we ever decide is predetermined by some fateful neurocomputer and we're just simply along for the ride until we die. Maybe some thoughts and decisions are ours (us, as in our Ego, our conscious observer of ourselves) and others are simply the result of the biocomputers within our skulls? Who knows. Not I. Doubt anyone knows, really, and this is the sort of thing that can be philosophized about to the nth degree forever.

I met a semi-homeless man at the beach a couple years ago, on my birthday, who displayed very obvious signs of split personality disorder. He would continue speaking the same thought/sentence while rotating through I think 8 different personas. It was fascinating. After a while I subtly asked him about it and he was like "Oh, you can tell huh?" Yeah dude.. it's very obvious, and fascinating. He told me it was the result of smashing his head WAY too many times in hockey fights and doctors basically told him he had fractured his brain and had to live with it. It was VERY interesting to see that pasty white man shift gears into his "blacky the slave," persona mid-sentence. So much so that even though it was My birthday, I offered him a ride home (where he was locked out/banned for a day for being angry) and took him out for dinner at a nearby sushi place just to continue hearing his stories as he rotated through various versions of himself while maintaining his train of thought.

One thing I learned during my unhappy and fortunately brief two months in NYC--don't engage the homeless, it can be a dangerous thing to do. And IMO the guy you talked to just sounds nuts. In true multiple personality disorder the personalities are distinct and fully realized.

Homeless people don't frighten me. They're just humans without a roof over their head - and seeing now that the average home price in the region exceeds $1M, there are a lot more "regular," homeless people than just the severely mentally ill than ever.

This dude was legit. He wasn't acting or faking. It was pretty interesting. I'm sure there must be different types of multiple personality disorder. His was apparently caused by repeated head trauma & concussions until he broke his brain.