Please enable JavaScript.

Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.

Perspectives on Free Will, Mental illnesses appear to undermine the…

- - - - Libet's experiments
        
        Feeling of the act ('willing') comes after the readiness potential - voluntary acts begin unconsciously
        
        Critiques
        
        Takes time between when you want to flex wrist and then look at the time on the clock- may be a lag because of this - can't be at the exact time you got the conscious experience of will
        
        We may be too slow at processing the visual clock stimuli accurately
        
        May forget exact location if they recall position later on
        
        To record RP you have to repeat the action loads and get an average --> Could become automatic decision - do they really have conscious control? Also, tiredness and fatigue.
        
        Is it really voluntary when you have to flex your wrist: Behaviour is confined. Also despite them saying there is no time limit, a ppt may feel oblidged to go fast due to them needing to go somewhere
        
        Ppts can't really blink after an act as it will intervene with results, however they were given the option to if necessary. This may dictate when they wanted to act and thus is not properly fw.
        
        Motor control decision can't be generalised to all decisions: Some are more complicated? Not forced choice like this.
        
        can be interpretted as supporting determinism
      - Alien Hand syndrome: Can produce complex movements against their wil. Suggests will is a sense that we have, but it is not necessary for behaviour. It could be a by-product of it, or links to Wegners proposel of what makes us think we have free will. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will#Related_brain_disorder https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will#Other_views
      - Tourettes syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will#Other_views
    - - Thought experiment
      - Knows future
      - Way of showing determinism
    - - Hormones
        
        Influence our behaviour and thinking
        
        serotonin (5-Hydroxytryptamine, 5-HT) plays a cru-cial role in mood disorders and their treatment (Nemeroff,2002)
      - Genes
        
        genes are (or act as) programs -> individual behaviour is based on them.
        
        Variance in antisocial personality and behavior (APB) is due to genetic contributions. Results indicatedthat 56% of the variance in APB can be explained through genetic influences, with 11%due to shared non-genetic influences, and 31% due to unique non-genetic influences. http://psych.colorado.edu/~carey/courses/psyc5112/Readings/aspEvolution_Fuergerson.pdf
        
        Significant association between the s/s-allele within serotonin transporter gene (SCL6A) and major depression (Collier et al.,1996; meta-analysis:Lotrich and Pollock, 2004). Lotrich, F.E., Pollock, B.G., 2004. Meta-analysis of serotonin trans-porter polymorphisms and affective disorders. Psychiatr. Genet.14, 121—129. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0306453009001140
      - TBI
        
        Relatives identified behaviour change in about 80% of the patients and significant practical problems were reported at home in about half of all severely head-injured people. Symptoms appeared to be persistent and tended to worsen over a three-year period following the injury. In particular, aggressive behaviour increased. (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/026921559601000215)
        
        Aggressive behavior was found in 33.7% of TBI patients and 11.5% of patients without TBI during the first 6 months after injury. Aggressive behavior was significantly associated with the presence of major depression, frontal lobe lesions, poor premorbid social functioning, and a history of alcohol and substance abuse. Interventions aimed at treatment of depression and substance abuse and enhancing social support may help reduce the severity of this disruptive behavior. (https://neuro.psychiatryonline.org/doi/full/10.1176/jnp.18.1.21)
        This is evidence for both internal and external factors determining behaviour (agression)- Area of brain damage, substance abuse influencing brainfunctioning, social factors
        
        Law: TBI: not responsible for their behaviour? Suggests that we are our brain and the workings of this determine our actions
    - - Bandura (1961) showed that children become aggressive through observation and imitation of their violent parents
    - - Three key factors that make up our senstaion of free will: Priority (critical period when an event happens), consistency (thing happening every time you do something) and exclusivity (no other obvious explanation). People wrongly interpret their own thought as the cause of their action, producing the feeling of free will
      - Shown that people often experience conscious will over behaviors that they have not caused. Also shown that people can be led to experience a lack of will over behaviors they did cause. E.g. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1053810004001205?via%3Dihub (priming of potential action effects enhances people’s feeling of causing these effects when they occur, even for subliminal priming and conscious awareness of priming.
  - - - E.g. serial killer has tumour = can't blame them as it is the cause. Have terrible upbringing = should still not blame them
      - Still should have a justice system: To protect society. Utilitarianism. General detterance
    - - You are your brain - you do make unconscious decisions. Just like your body makes red blood cells etc. If your heart stops pumping blood, you are a victim of that change. What is the differece between this and your unconscious thoughts having an influence on your behaviour? We aren't responsible for what our brain does - no free will