Free will, what is it and do human beings have it? Does everyone have free will? Is free will a concept to be able to account for the evils within our world if you believe in any form of a higher power? Is free will a real thing, or is everyone’s fate predetermined and just playing out according to a master plan or grand design? Do individuals with mental health disorders or disabilities that impair their critical thinking and decision-making skills do they have free will? Do you have to believe in a higher power to believe in the concept of free will, or does that not matter or play a role in whether or not you have free will? These are the questions I think about when the concept of free will arises.
“The Metaphysical Problem of human freedom might be summarized in the following way: Human beings are responsible agents; but this fact appears to conflict with a deterministic view of human action (the view that every event that is involved in an act is caused by some other event); and it also appears to conflict with an in deterministic view of human action (the view that the act, or some event that is essential to the act, is not caused at all.) To solve the problem, I believe, we must make somewhat far-reaching assumptions about the self or the agent about the man who performs the act” (Feinberg & Shafer-Landau, 2017, p.483).
Free will can mean many things to many different people depending on your beliefs, culture, and religious views. If you were to survey a hundred people globally about what they believe free will to be, their answers would vary immensely. One of the things that really take center stage when discussing free will is a person’s moral beliefs. What you believe to be right, fair, and goodwill shape how you view free will and what you consider to be immoral and irreconcilable will also have a role in your perception of free will. “In assessing the significance of free will, we are forced to consider questions about (among others) rightness and wrongness, good and evil, virtue and vice, blame and praise, reward and punishment, and desert. The topic of free will also gives rise to purely empirical questions that are beginning to be explored in the human sciences: do we have it, and to what degree?” (O’Connor & Franklin, 2018, p.2).
Free will, free choice, or the power to choose and make critical decisions all go hand in hand. Most people believe that you always have a choice no matter the situation, you can choose to act or not to act. This has been the rational foundation for this is why humans have free will because they have the power to choose and act in almost all situations. Some say that it is our choices and actions that define what kind of person you are because you have the willpower to choose and decide based upon your own moral compass. Our moral compass is an internalized set of values and objectives that guide a person with regard to ethical behavior and decision-making. In other words, what makes us decent people.
Moral intelligence, self-awareness, ethical principles, and values like integrity and compassion for others all play a part in shaping a person’s moral compass. Moral intelligence requires one to attend to a moral compass or the self-knowledge that empowers you to act with authenticity and integrity, true to your ideal self. To calibrate your compass, you align your values, goals, and actions with over-arching ethical principles. The following descriptions and exercises will guide you through this process.
According to Lennick and Kiel, authors of Moral Intelligence 2.0, “the most effective leaders hold to a common set of principles and consistently use those principles to guide their day-to-day actions. They don’t make up their values as they go along; they listen carefully to the call of moral values that already lie within all of us. The principles business leaders follow are the same set of principles that all human societies throughout time have believed to be right. These fundamental beliefs have been embedded in human society for so long that they are now widely recognized as universal” (2011, p.36). They assert that four principles are vital for sustained personal and organizational success: 1) Integrity, 2) Responsibility, 3) Compassion, and 4) Forgiveness. How you express these principles through your chosen values and actions will be particular to your own culture, upbringing, and individual preference (Baker, 2017).
What about those individuals who never developed a moral compass? Some people have developmental issues that prevent them from ever really developing a moral compass, and they are just incapable of having any sympathy or compassion for others. There are also those individuals who have learning impairments and disabilities that prevent them from developing any kind of emotional or moral intelligence. So do those individuals not have free will? I think legally, courts and governments rule them unable to have the capacity to make any kind of critical decisions because they aren’t able to comprehend the weight of their decisions beyond a child-like level and don’t understand the gravity of their actions or choices. So do all humans have free will? No, I don’t think that we all have it when you look at the aforementioned limitations that some individuals might have with their moral and emotional intelligence.
How do religion and spirituality play a role in free will? Although free will has been defined in multiple, conflicting ways, the present approach analyzes it as a psychological capacity subsuming self-control, effortful choice, planning, and initiative. These capabilities are useful for making human social life and culture possible, but they depend on a limited resource and, therefore, often fall short of optimal levels. Religion may be helpful to individuals and society in part because it supports both the exercise of free will and the belief in it (Baumeister et al., 2010).
In conclusion, the concept of free will includes many dimensions and interpretations. Essentially, one’s moral beliefs identify the main way someone perceives their free will or lack thereof. In that way, the reviewed concept is highly dependent on a particular understanding of common ethical values one’s ability to differentiate between right and wrong. This idea is followed by an introduction of the moral compass, a representation of standardized rules regarding people’s ethical stance and decision-making. Since it is believed that every person has a right to choose based on their own preferences, all humans must possess a certain level of free will. Of course, some experience more restrictions in terms of expressing it, like social injustice issues and other modern problems often stand in the way of fair human judgment. Therefore, while theoretically, it should be possible, not all people possess the privileges of such ethical choices.
Still, culture and religion can be viewed as the key elements for exploring and expressing one’s free will. They carry out these functions by allowing people to make their own decisions while retaining faith and hoping for the best outcomes. Additionally, most religions preach sets of moral values that guide individuals in living their lives in peace and harmony. Ultimately, a healthy lifestyle promotes and involves one’s ability to plan and initiate their own routines.
In other fields of our society, such as the business field, one’s effective manipulations of their free will allow them to stay successful and powerful. In that way, by accentuating their skilful abilities in decision-making, leaders use the basic moral principles as their guide. Consequently, minimal external factors limit their career opportunities and further progress. In the end, human beings do not all possess free will, as not all people are able to stay committed to one moral compass. On the other hand, those who value particular moral principles tend to have more free will.
References
Baker, K. (2017). Developing moral intelligence [PDF document]. Vanderbilt University. Web.
Baumeister, R. F., Bauer, I. M., & Lloyd, S. A. (2010). Choice, free will, and religion. Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, 2(2), 67–82. Web.
Feinberg, J., & Shafer-Landau, R. (2017). Reason and responsibility: Readings in some basic problems of philosophy. Cengage Learning.
Lennick, D., & Kiel, F. (2011). Moral intelligence 2.0: Enhancing business performance and leadership success in turbulent times. Pearson Prentice Hall.
O’Connor, T., & Franklin, C. (2018). Free will. In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University.