"Quantum physics proves free will is true and determinism is wrong!"

This is something people often say to me: "If you look at the double slit experiment and the quantum eraser experiment, you see that determinism is an old classical physics idea that has been superseded. The observer determines reality. Therefore, free will exists."


And my response:

Quantum physics cannot show that determinism is wrong. That is impossible, because there is no way to prove that randomness exists (even Bell's Theorem may in fact indicate superdeterminism despite the general understanding of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell%27s_theorem#Superdeterminism). We don't know if there is a better way of expressing quantum physics aside from probabilities. So far, our formulas work based on probability. But in the future, we could have more exact math. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hidden_variable_theory

And even if randomness were somehow the case, that still would not allow for free will, which is logically impossible regardless of what physics you may think you know. If your choices are generated at random, is that what you call free will? Information Philosophy has an interesting take on this, showing how it is *possible* that randomness co-exists with determinism, such that creativity comes randomly out of some infinite pool of possibility, and is then narrowed down deterministically. In this way, there is indeterminism, in the sense that the future can never be known, yet causality is not broken. "Free will" is redefined as "freedom, then (determined) will" or "free/will." According to Buddhism, the future can be known, so I'm not sure that this I-Phi stuff has any merit apart from being a theoretically interesting proposition.

The observer effect has nothing to do with free will, either. In fact, the observer doesn't need to be a human. It can be an instrument (and it is, always--no experiment on quantum physics is done without instruments, and those observing instruments cannot observe without also influencing the behavior of that which they are observing, just as your eye cannot perceive a photon without capturing it from the scene).

You are positing something that is neither random, nor deterministic. So what is it? What makes "free will" tick? Why choose one thing over another thing? You say it is very subtle. But if it is too subtle for even you to understand, perhaps it is just a simple delusion. So far, nobody has been able to give any logical argument or even been able to define free will logically. If you can do that, you might win a Nobel Prize.

P.S. Please see my post on determinism vs dependent origination.

Also see my post on whether consciousness can create conditions instead of vice versa.

Determinism vs. Dependent Origination

[quote]Are you clear here that there is no guiding?[/quote]

Everything is guided but no guider.

Or,  nothing is guided, because guiding implies that things can happen differently than they do if not for the guidance. Is a flower guided toward the sun? What guides it? The sun? DNA? We could say, yes, the sun and DNA guide the flower's growth. Or we could say that the growth is inseparable from its conditions, there's no split in reality. 

Determinism to most people implies causation, which implies causes separate from results. Dependent origination shows that there are causes & conditions, but those causes & conditions are not separate from the things they influence. In a sense, they *are* those things. Only by later designating one thing to be a condition, and another thing to be a result, can we split reality up into linear time and subject/object consciousness. 

My understanding of dependent origination is that of maybe a first-grader in public school. If you want a scholarly understanding, I suggest you read Nagarjuna. However, Nagarjuna is not just a scholar but also aims at breaking the mind almost koan-like. So logicians would probably not agree with much of what he is saying.

I did recently read a book which is highly revered by some folks as explaining the difference between determinism and the teaching of dependent origination from the Pali canon, but I found it lacking. Here's my review: http://www.amazon.com/gp/review/R3TPBIEVR53KWN

Is everything "nothing"? Is it all "One Mind"? Or dependently originated?

I often find that folks have a few illogical ideas about the nature of reality which crop up once the common views are seen thru.

First, the "everything is nothing" idea:  Actually, I can see why a very rough understanding of dependent origination would be simply that "there is nothing." That's because when we commonly think of "something," we are imagining some kind of essence. In reality, there are no essences to anything, since everything arises dependent upon everything else, so to that simple mindset used to imputing inherency to things, dependent origination may as well be "there is nothing." But compare the simplicity of "there is nothing" (which also makes no sense of reality, merely negating it all), to the incredible profundity of dependent origination: http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2009/10/dzogchen-rigpa-and-dependent.html

The most obvious problem with the "everything is nothing" idea is that it explains nothing. Which is fine, if you don't mind being completely ignorant. But then what is the point of having this view if everything is nothing? The view itself is nothing, so does not even exist?

Tell me what you think of this,

Everything that's happened, never happened, it's a thought living in your consciousness falsely perceived as being in the nonexistent past. The point is the past doesn't exist so nothing that ever happened really happened and of course

the same holds true for the future and the present which is undefinable. I'm enjoying this.

Again, I think you are getting stuck in this either/or mode of perception. Either things are real, or they aren't, for you. 

What I'm trying to show you is that the either/or is not the way reality is. Buddha said that self neither exists, nor doesn't exist, nor both exists and doesn't exist, nor neither exists nor doesn't exist. That's the famous "tetralemma" which he applied to all things. What is the point of that? The point is that dependent origination is not simply about denying reality as it is experienced. It is about explaining it logically so that it can be seen for what it is.

Perhaps it would be better to say, "everything that's happened happened as interdependent processes functioning perfectly and ultimately timelessly, but was misperceived to be independent, linear and discrete events which caused suffering."

Second, the "everything is One Mind" idea: I can say that I have experienced One Mind many times... so I understand it from that level of experience.

But I've also come to realize, as Bill F. explains, that One Mind experience is simply the last illusion that remains due to conditioned belief in the self. In other words, we still cling to the notion of self, the background permanent awareness that all things spring from or are contained in, even tho we can't locate it, so instead, we say, oh, well then everything is self, it is all One Mind. Thus, we are still suffering in order to continue splitting reality into two: the universe (let's say appearances), and that universal consciousness which is aware of everything. In order to stop splitting reality up like this, we have to let go of the idea that there is something separate containing everything else. Then we arrive at dependent origination, the view that everything is a reflection of everything else (NOT that everything IS everything else)... i.e. it is not possible for anything to affect anything else without also itself being affected, nor is it possible for anything to be unaffected or not affect the rest of the universe. This much I actually did see with ayahuasca originally, but somehow this infinite reflection (Indra's Net) also had the One Mind identity traces within it.

With One Mind, we haven't actually gotten away from self or any of the suffering caused by self. We've simply expanded our view of self and lost sight of much of the previously clearly visible suffering. Why does one in One Mind consciousness still suffer, even if almost imperceptibly? Because the clinging to a fixed nature remains, yet in reality there is nothing that is fixed or unchanging ever. Since the One Mind is a fabrication, clinging to it does not lead to freedom from the cycle of birth and death. Every fabrication will eventually dissolve due to the changing conditions which it relies upon for its support.

Also, importantly, One Mind does not have much explanatory power. It does not explain why there are such a variety of appearances rather than just one appearance of the One Mind. It also does not explain how so much of the one mind can be apparently unaware of the One Mind. The one thing that One Mind does explain is the amazing sense of unity among all apparently separate appearances that can be realized. This unity is actually the infinite interpenetration and reflection of all appearances which dependently originate from each other, but without seeing dependent origination, we have no choice but to imagine that there must be One Mind.  

Zen teachings have some interesting things to say about the illusion of One Mind. Check the fourth paragraph on this page:

http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2015/02/bill-f-practice-and-insights.html

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Buddha said that the first being in each universe falls under the delusion that it created the universe, since it finds itself alone in it and only after wishing for company does it find others existing in it. This first being thinks it is the God of the universe, but with the demise of the universe comes the demise of this and all other beings. I find this an interesting idea, although it isn't necessarily important for the current discussion.

The unfortunate misunderstanding of Buddha's teaching on Karma & Free Will

Namaste friends!

Today I'd like to go over what I perceive to be a very widely held misunderstanding regarding the nature of reality: specifically, free will. Even many buddhists (for example, Thanissaro Bikkhu and the editor of Accesstoinsight.org, the largest archive of English translations of the Pali cannon online), do not seem to understand that free will does not exist.

First, a cautionary note: no free will does not mean you don't need to practice to awaken. Please see this post on pathologies of insight. If what is done does not matter in terms of future outcomes, then there is no dependent causation, everything must be random. That is nonsensical.

Now, let's remind ourselves what Buddha's primary teaching was: dependent origination, or in Pali, pratityasamutpada. Here is the Dalai Lama's etymological definition:

"Dependent-arising [origination, NOT arising!] is the general philosophy of all Buddhist systems even though many different interpretations are found among these systems. In Sanskrit the word for dependent-arising is pratityasamutpada. The word pratitya has three different meanings–meeting, relying, and depending–but all three, in terms of their basic import, mean dependence.Samutpada means arising. Hence, the meaning of pratityasamutpada is that which arises in dependence upon conditions, in reliance upon conditions, through the force of conditions. On a subtle level, it is explained as the main reason why phenomena are empty of inherent existence." Dalai Lama (1992) p.35, The Meaning of Life, translated and edited by Jeffrey Hopkins, Wisdom

This would naturally lead one to see that free will is an illusion. However, that is a very hard pill for many to swallow! So instead they make logical leaps to say that Buddha never taught that free will does not exist. To support their positions, they point to various suttas in which the Buddha explains that it is a wrong view to suppose that past karma causes present conditions and thus we are unable to change our circumstances. He says if this were true, then there would be no need for practice in order to awaken.

Here's a quote from Thanissaro Bikkhu:

...one of the many things the Buddha discovered in the course of his awakening was that causality is not linear. The experience of the present is shaped both by actions in the present and by actions in the past. Actions in the present shape both the present and the future. The results of past and present actions continually interact. Thus there is always room for new input into the system, which gives scope for free will.^[1]

But this reasoning misses that the "new input" into the system is a result of previous inputs. There is no such thing as a "new input" which is outside of the web of causes & conditions. Also, although it may be true that the past is somehow shaped by the present and the future, it is not true in any practical sense. One could say that our thoughts about the past determine the past "for us." But regardless of what we think of the past, it still happened the way it happened to produce the present circumstances. If this were not the case, then it would make no sense to do practice to awaken, as Buddha said, because practicing a skill relies on the assumption of the linearity of time. If somehow it were true that our future abilities determined how we practiced to develop those abilities, it still would not matter in terms of the way we approach practice. We would still have to approach practice pragmatically with a linear perspective in order to have any hope of developing skills.

Indeed, in higher dimensions, I have seen that time is an illusion. However, people often see this and then think that it means practice is meaningless. Remember, you are reading this now in linear time, even if from a higher dimension everything happens all at once. To get to that transcendent perspective, we, paradoxically, have to take actions within this linear time dimension. Also, remember that just because time is an illusion does not mean that free will exists! It doesn't matter whether time is linear or not. If everything actually happens all at once, that still leaves no room for free will. If the present influences the past & future, that still leaves no room for free will.

Although free will does not exist (in fact it is not even a logical concept that can be said to either exist nor not exist), one still must follow the moral guidance of something like the eightfold path to increase their chances of waking up from the dream of free will & identity. If we just go about our daily lives as before, satisfying our selfish desires at the expense of others, we are unlikely gain equanimity & dispassion for the world. Without dispassion & equanimity there is not much chance for liberation from samsara. But the eightfold path is a mundane teaching (which can lead to better rebirths or conditions here), which then must be superseded by the transcendent teaching of no free will, nobody here, everything already perfect, in order for a "being" to be released from samsara. As Buddha said, all of his teachings eventually must be left at the shore in order to cross the great divide between samsara and nibbana (nirvana).

Oh, dispassion is another misunderstood word. Many people think that when I talk about dispassion, I'm saying you should be like a rock. No emotions. Then of course nobody will want to be near you.

Actually, whatever emotions come up are fine. The point is not to block emotions, but rather to see thru them & to realize they are not your emotions. You can still be loving to your family, but realize that this love is not yours, this family is not yours, nobody is here, and everything is always happening perfectly according to natural laws. Indeed, Buddha taught that one should develop compassion even as one develops dispassion. Compassion is needed on the path to letting go. And with letting go, one attains the great peace and freedom from which true transcendental love (agape, metta) and compassion (karuna) spring forth.

Lest you be unconvinced by "my" pedestrian brain, please peruse the excellent book, Free Will by neuroscientist & Buddhist practitioner Sam Harris (or check his youtube videos on the subject). His book Waking Up (free first chapter online) is also excellent and possibly a better use of your time, as it includes insights from his book on free will, as well as giving sage advice on awakening, while acknowledging that he himself has only had glimpses of it (as is the case for myself as well up to this point).

If you are wondering which awakened Buddhist masters support "my" position, the only one I know of for sure in my limited readings is Ajahn Brahm. He is quite explicit that you have no free choice. And he is one of the most highly regarded masters today in Theravada Buddhism. Strangely, Brahm only makes passing mention of this key point in his book, Meditation, Bliss, and Beyond, as he prefers to teach people to enter the states of meditative absorption known as jhana. I can see why he prefers jhana, although he admits it does not directly lead to liberation, but it certainly does remove doubt about the possibility of liberation. And I can vouch for his instructions to achieve it: following them, I achieved first jhana in a week (really one day of intense practice while I was sick). It is infinitely better than sex, as he advertises!

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Now, I will be the first to admit that my understanding of dependent origination is at a kindergarten level compared to the likes of Nagarjuna. So perhaps in some sense there is neither free will nor is everything determined by conditions (since according to Nagarjuna, conditions are dependently designated based upon results). If you would like to study Nagarjuna, and then get back to me on what you learn, I'd love to hear it.