A Summary of ‘Determined’ by Robert Sapolsky — Does Free Will Exist?
Alexander Horwitz, M.D.
The below article was done by Alexander Horwitz MD in conjunction with our interview with Dr. Robert Sapolsky. I (Dr. Puder) found Alexander’s superb writing and thoughts needed to stand alone from my own write up and reflections of the episode: Episode 195: Dr. Robert Sapolsky: Baboons, Stress Research, Connection and Determinism
You can find our interview on YouTube: here
Today on the podcast, we are joined by Robert Sapolsky, Ph.D., who is a primatologist and neuroendocrinologist at Stanford University. Sapolsky is a recipient of a MacArthur Foundation genius grant. His lab at Stanford has spent decades examining the neurobiology of stress. In addition to lab work, Sapolsky also spent three decades studying the social biology and physiology of wild baboons in a national park in Kenya. Sapolsky has written a book called Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will (release date: October 17, 2023), which argues against the notion of free will and is discussed in the episode.
In 2017, Sapolsky published the book Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, which was based off of his incredibly popular “Human Biology Course” at Stanford. Behave examined the numerous factors that shape human behavior and is a synthesis of neurobiology, endocrinology, molecular biology, genetics, anthropology, psychology, and sociology. Guiding the flow of the book is the concept of time and how it relates to shaping a particular behavior from the moment the behavior occurred, to seconds and minutes before, to days and weeks before, back to adolescence, childhood, infancy, to the time you spent in your mother’s womb, to the culture in which you live, to your ancestors’ culture, and beyond. To quote Sapolsky:
“And it is indeed a mess, a subject involving brain chemistry, hormones, sensory cues, prenatal environment, early experience, genes, both biological and cultural evolution, and ecological pressures, among other things.”
Although the subject matter of Behave and Determined is inherently complex, Sapolsky is a master at distilling complex ideas and creating a sense of wonder at both the complexity and beauty of the natural world. His writing is frequently interjected with humor, pop culture references, famous historical events, personal anecdotes, and the occasional expletive. At the end of Behave, Sapolsky concludes that humans do not have free will. Determined is in some ways an extension of Behave, further arguing why free will does not exist and addressing logical flaws in the arguments for the existence of free will. Determined ends by examining what society might look like if we were to recognize that free will does not exist.
The previous Psychiatry and Psychotherapy episodes about free will explored various definitions of free will, the benefits of believing in free will, and also provided criticism of the book Free Will by Sam Harris who, like Sapolsky, does not believe that humans possess free will. As mentioned in the previous episodes, despite claims made by Harris, the notion of free will has never been proven or disproven. It is unlikely that in the near future there will be one single piece of information that allows us to conclusively prove that free will does or does not exist. To borrow a term from law, Sapolsky makes his argument using the totality of the circumstances by utilizing all of the information available, as opposed to a less ambiguous bright line test.
This episode will provide a counterbalance to the three previous episodes on free will by Dr. Puder and Dr. Matt Hagele. Although Drs. Puder and Hagele set out to not steer listeners in one direction or another about the existence of free will, their opinions manifested within the introduction of the write-up for the first episode:
‘There has been a war about the subjects of determinism and free will since the very beginning of recorded writings. Within that war, some people use “science” as their main defense, but they present a viewpoint that no scientific experiment could prove. The problem with this is that the general public takes the statement as fact and then acts on it.
Free will and determinism are important to the mental health of individuals because there is a strong tie between our beliefs in this and our general mood, happiness, and sense of meaning in life. The question of whether or not free will exists centers around how much choice we have versus how much is determined by our genes and environment.’
By examining Sapolsky’s view of free will, listeners/readers will have a more complete understanding of the various thoughts that inform the modern free will debate.
Disclaimer: with Determined, Sapolsky has taken an incredibly complex topic and simplified it as much as possible. Determined is focused on free will and also contains a concise summary of Behave, which is over 700 pages. This written summary for the podcast can obviously never address the full complexity of Determined. For the sake of brevity, certain topics have been superficially explored while many are altogether ignored. There will inevitably be mistakes but hopefully most major ideas have been accurately communicated. We hope that reading this summary will stimulate intellectual curiosity and the desire to read Determined.
Turtles All the Way Down
The title of the first chapter comes from an apocryphal encounter between psychologist William James and a woman who approached him after he lectured about the nature of life and the universe. The woman told James he was incorrect and that the world rests on the back of a large turtle. James, somewhat surprised, asked what the turtle rests on, to which the woman stated, on the back of another turtle (which rests on the back of another turtle on the back of another turtle, etc.). Hence, turtles all the way down. Sapolsky uses this as a sort of analogy for the causality of human behavior and, therefore, free will. He recognizes that while it may seem absurd to think of an infinite series of turtles, it is less absurd than to consider a turtle (i.e., part of the causal chain of behavior) floating in air (i.e., free of causality).
Sapolsky delineates two broad goals for Determined:
To convince readers that there is no free will or that we have much less free will than is generally assumed when it “really matters.” The point of the book is not to convince everyone that free will does not exist; he would be happy if more people recognized how constrained we are in terms of our behaviors.
To explain why those who believe in free will are incorrect and how life would improve if we stopped believing in free will.
Free Will Defined
Although there is no universally agreed upon definition of free will, Sapolsky notes:
“Show me a neuron (or brain) whose generation of a behavior is independent of the sum of its biological past, and for the purpose of this book, you’ve demonstrated free will.”
“In order to prove there’s free will, you have to show me that some behavior just happened out of thin air in the sense of considering all of these biological precursors.”
Determinism Defined
Sapolsky suggests that it is helpful to start out by defining determinism by considering the 18th/19th century French polymath Pierre Simon Laplace who said that if you had a theoretical superhuman who knew the location of every particle in the universe, said superhuman could accurately predict every moment in the future. Laplace also believed if said superhuman knew every past location of every past particle, they could accurately predict the present and that the past would always lead to the present. This does not leave any wiggle room; the past and the future are already determined.
Contemporary views of determinism differ from Laplace in at least three key ways. As it turns out, certain events are not predictable and the universe is not always deterministic. Next, is the role of meta-level consciousness and the constraint of being aware of anything that might affect your thinking (e.g., idealizing your father and wanting to be exactly like him or hating your father and wanting to be the complete opposite of him). Lastly, determinism does not preclude change.
Four Common Beliefs About the Nature of Free Will
There are four common beliefs when it comes to free will:
The world is deterministic and there is no free will. This is often referred to as “hard incompatibilism.” Sapolsky notes that while many people make a distinction between “hard incompatibilism” and “hard determinism,” he refers to them synonymously. Sapolsky argues for “hard determinism.”
The world is deterministic and there is free will. Stated another way: a deterministic world is compatible with free will. Sapolsky notes the vast majority of philosophers and legal scholars maintain this position.
The world is not deterministic and there is no free will.
The world is not deterministic and there is free will. Sapolsky describes those holding this view as “libertarian incompatibilists” who appear to be a rarity.
Sapolsky maintains that if the world is deterministic and there is no free will: “We are nothing more or less than the biological and environmental luck, over which we had no control, that has brought us to any moment.” Therefore, he maintains that it is not just to hold people morally responsible for their actions. Another implication if free will does not exist is that we do not deserve praise for our best actions.
Phineas Gage and a Sliding Scale of Free Will
In 1848, Phineas Gage was involved in a railroad accident that led to a large metal tamping rod shooting into the left side of his face and through his skull. Gage survived the accident but there was a stark change in his previously mild-mannered personality. He became disinhibited and capricious. It is easy for almost anyone to accept that Gage’s post-accident behavior was caused by his injury. Many people tend to think of free will as existing on a sliding scale. For example, having low blood glucose limits free will, as does being intoxicated from alcohol or getting little sleep. The more factors you consider, the smaller our inner locus of control. Sapolsky argues that the idea of an inner self or homunculus separate from our biology and environment is spurious, which leads him to conclude that our best and worst behaviors are no more controllable than Gage’s.
Goodbye, Libet
It is almost impossible to talk about free will without mentioning the seminal 1983 paper by Libet et al. Drs. Puder and Hagele extensively covered the original study as well as the subsequent studies and controversies in the previous episodes of the podcast. Luckily for us, and for the sake of brevity, the studies are probably irrelevant. Although the studies attempt to prove that free will does not exist, their collective proof is far from conclusive.
Intent
A large part of the debate around free will involves intent. Sapolsky asserts that a common flaw in the reasoning of those who advocate for the existence of free will is failure to examine the source of intent. Behave can be thought of as a 700-page treatise on the seemingly limitless sources of intent, which is condensed into a single chapter in Determined.
The Neurobiology of Intent
In order to understand a behavior, you need to understand what happened seconds before the behavior as well as minutes, days, years and even millennia before the behavior occurred. Although Sapolsky would likely scorn him being labeled as a “neuro-essentialist,” he recognizes that the brain is the final common pathway for everything affecting behavior. He repeatedly states that by examining one discipline to explain a behavior (as well as the argument around the existence of free will; although this is not to equate the two), you are invoking all of the other various disciplines because they are inextricably related. For example, neurobiology is influenced by genetics, which is influenced by environment, which is influenced by evolutionary biology, etc. By examining every possible biological component that explains intent, Sapolsky asserts that “there is no room for free will.”
Sapolsky warns about the pitfalls of not considering a historical view when judging people's behavior, especially when the judgment is moralistic. Daniel Dennett of Tufts University is a famous philosopher and leading compatibilist who appears to take an ahistorical approach by asserting that “Luck averages out in the long run." Dennett has used the metaphor of a marathon to illustrate his point and that small advantages even out over time. If someone deserves to win, they will have plenty of opportunities to overcome their disadvantages. Sapolsky sees this as “One step above believing that God invented poverty to punish sinners."
Let us reconsider one of the two quotes from above about defining free will:
“In order to prove there’s free will, you have to show me that some behavior just happened out of thin air in the sense of considering all of these biological precursors.”
Some people, such as prominent compatibilist philosopher Alfred Mele, take issue with the definition. Mele believes this bar is "absurdly high." To Mele, certain events are so detached in time (e.g. your ancestors' culture thousands of years back or even what was happening a minute ago), that they do not affect free will and responsibility. This conclusion is often explained by one or two factors. The first is that the remote event was seemingly irrelevant and that the consequences of your biological and environmental luck are filtered through some sort of a material "you.” The second thought is basically Dennett’s line of thinking and that things even out over time.
Sapolsky again stresses the importance of defining free will as only being possible if neurons’ actions are completely uninfluenced by all the uncontrollable factors that came before. It does not take much to prove to many of us (beyond an elderly white man who was born a man and a member of the dominant ethnic group of a developed country during a time of relative economic prosperity with an exceptionally high IQ to relatively affluent parents with high IQs and advanced degrees and then went on to attend one of the most prestigious university preparatory schools and then got his own advanced degrees and became a leading philosopher) things do not even out over time. This is not to say that said elderly white man did not ever suffer or did not suffer immensely and often, but compared to the other eight billion people on the planet, he had an absurd advantage from the beginning and throughout his life. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, kid.
Sapolsky broadly divides the nervous system into three components and their role to pro- and antisocial behaviors:
The amygdala: the hub of fear, aggression, and arousal.
The dopaminergic system: the hub of reward, anticipation, and motivation.
The frontal cortex: the hub of regulation and restraint. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) is essential to executive function and decision making. The PFC also sends excitatory signals to the motor cortex and inhibits habitual brain circuits. The PFC is important for inhibiting more emotional brain regions. In one well-replicated study, volunteers were put in a brain scanner and briefly shown pictures of various faces. Flash the face of someone of another race up and 75% of subjects have activation in their amygdala. This occurs in under a tenth of a second. In the majority of the subjects after a few seconds the PFC is able to turn off the amygdala; Sapolsky likens this to a delayed frontal cortical voice stating "Don’t think that way. That is not who I am."
Similar to Behave, Determined also considers the additional brain regions:
The insular cortex (insula), which is involved in olfactory and gustatory disgust. In addition, the insula also responds to moral disgust (i.e., stimuli we deem as morally disgusting). Sapolsky explains that the insula’s ability to help protect us from spoiled food developed around 100 million years ago and that much later (tens of thousands of years ago), humans developed constructs like morality and resulting disgust at violating moral norms. Because brains were not able to develop ad-hoc specialized brain regions with such short notice, the insula became responsible for moral disgust. The difficulty is that the insula cannot differentiate responses to moral disgust versus olfactory or gustatory disgust and that stimulation of the insula activates the amygdala (which as noted above, is responsible for fear and aggression).
Similarly, the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is involved in assessing beauty and morality. In three studies, subjects were placed in brain scanners and assessing independently beauty and morality both caused the OFC to light up.1-3 Confusing beauty for morality has major implications for the sentencing of judgment in the criminal justice system. As Sapolsky notes, does this by itself disprove free will? No way, but it is one of the hundreds of examples that he provides that collectively weaken the idea of volitional intent.
The Endocrinology of Intent
This is the provenance of a behavior days to weeks before it occurs. Our hormone levels have a strong effect on behavior although endocrinology alone cannot account for a lack of free will. Sapolsky focuses on the following hormones although there are a multitude of hormones not mentioned:
Testosterone: Despite common misconceptions, testosterone does not cause aggression although it lowers the threshold for aggression, especially in those already prone to aggression.4 Testosterone has a host of other effects including distorting judgment by making neutral faces seem more threatening, making you more overconfident and less generous in economic games resulting in less cooperation, and increasing impulsivity. Testosterone sensitizes the amygdala to directly activate from a stimulus.
Oxytocin: Often referred to as the “love hormone,” which is also commonly misunderstood. Of note, monogamous species have a higher density of oxytocin receptors within the mesolimbic “reward” pathway of the brain. The type of oxytocin, and another hormone vasopressin, receptors you have at birth influence parenting style, stability of romantic relationships, aggressiveness, sensitivity to threat, and charitableness.5,6 Sapolsky addresses if humans are monogamous versus polygamous in Behave although in Determined he leaves it at humans being more monogamous than mouse lemurs but less polygamous than marmosets. Take that as you will. Although oxytocin has the opposite effect of testosterone on the amygdala and makes us more generous, empathic, and trusting with members of a group we consider to be like us, it has the opposite effect in thems (people we perceive as being of an outgroup).
Glucocorticoids: Hormones released during stress can be a good thing in the short term, but chronic glucocorticoid exposure has all sorts of deleterious effects including making us more prone to obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. Glucocorticoids also sensitize the amygdala and make it more responsive to stimuli, which activates the amygdala, which, in turn, activates the basal ganglia and disrupts the frontal cortex. This leads to faster habitual responses with low accuracy in assessing what is happening. Higher chronic levels of glucocorticoids make us fall back on old habits. During periods of high stress, if we often react to stress with anxiety, we become more anxious. If we often react to stress by feeling helpless, we become more depressed.
Weeks to Years Before
This is the provenance of multiple topics including neuroplasticity and the gut microbiome. There are innumerable examples of how neuroplasticity can affect behavior but Sapolsky focuses on the enlargement of the amygdala during Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and shrinking of the hippocampus during depression as extreme examples. Bacteria also have a role in affecting a behavior weeks before it occurs. Gut bacteria are responsible for subtly affecting a variety of effects including appetite, food cravings, gene expression in neurons, proclivity toward anxiety, and the speed at which some neurological diseases can spread through our brains.
In addition, Sapolsky also considers adolescence, childhood, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), prenatal environment, genetics, and your family's culture dating back centuries. For the sake of brevity, we will stick to considering a small portion of childhood. The developing brain is influenced by a variety of factors including parenting style, peer socialization, environmental influences (e.g., neighborhood safety, number of liquor stores versus libraries, and presence of readily available healthy food), and cultural beliefs and values among innumerable other things. As a random example, individuals who grew up in clement weather (with mild fluctuations around an average of 70 degrees) were on average more individualistic, extroverted, and open to novel experience with the magnitude of effect being equal or greater than that of age, gender, the country's GDP, population density, and means of production.7 As previously discussed, chronic elevated glucocorticoids have deleterious effects on the brain and can lead to impaired construction of the frontal cortex leading to poor impulse control in adulthood. Similarly, elevated levels of testosterone can lead to a more reactive amygdala and therefore more reactive aggression in adulthood. As stated by Sapolsky: “If you want to be better at being an adult, make sure you pick the right adolescence.”
Sapolsky emphasizes the importance of the environment. Different environments will cause different genetic changes (via epigenetics) in the same gene or genetic switch. For example, depending on your environment, a gene related to risk taking will influence whether you rob a store or gamble on founding a startup. A variant of a gene coding for the dopamine receptor makes you more or less likely to be generous depending on whether you grow up with or without secure parental attachment. The same gene variant is associated with poor gratification postponement if you are raised in poverty. There are numerous similar examples involving other gene-environment relations.8-11 He also stresses that the role of childhood does not by itself invalidate free will and that ACE scores are about adult potential and vulnerability but not destiny. There are numerous adults who have defied expectations given their childhoods; childhood is just one of many pieces in the sequence of influences. Considering all of the above factors helps create a seamless stream of influences, which precludes free will being in the brain but not of it.
The Myth of Grit
"It takes a certain kind of audacity and indifference to look at findings like these and still insist how readily someone does the harder things in life justifies blame, punishment, praise, or reward."
Sapolsky explores the seeming war of wills between the PFC and limbic system. Interestingly, the PFC is engaged when juries decide guilt or innocence while the limbic system is engaged when juries decide punishment.12,13 Although the PFC and limbic system appear to be in opposition, Sapolsky notes that in order to do the correct/harder thing, the PFC requires a large amount of limbic/emotional input.
Going back to childhood, childhood abuse creates an adult PFC that is smaller, thinner, with less gray matter and altered receptor density for various neurotransmitters. Childhood abuse also weakens the connection between the PFC and the amygdala, which leads to a greater tendency to respond to frustration with anger (i.e., “trait anger”). Childhood abuse is a risk factor for a child to grow up and abuse their own children. In one shocking example, at only one month of age, PFC circuitry is noticeably different in children whose mothers were abused in childhood.13,14 Low socioeconomic status or living in a high crime neighborhood for a pregnant woman both predict less cortical development in her baby at the time of birth.15 Similarly, the socioeconomic status of the child's family predicts the volume size and gray matter content of the PFC in kindergarteners, toddlers, 6-month-olds, and even 4-week olds.16-19 These brain changes are mediated by multiple factors including elevated glucocorticoids.
One argument for the emergence of free will is thinking about the transformation of free will over time. Philosopher Neil Levy believes that the passing of time offers opportunities for deliberation and reflection. Levy argues that at some point bad luck ceases to be an excuse for lack of free will. Sapolsky interprets this as "maybe no free will just now, but there was relevant free will in the past." Dennett in response to the idea that we have no control over our biology or environment noted that autonomy is a process that initially is beyond one’s control but as time goes on, we have the opportunity to refine our activities, choices, thoughts, and attitudes. Similarly, philosopher Robert Kane has noted that free will is more than free action and concerns what he terms "self-reflection.” Kane believes that choosing who we are happens at moments of crisis he refers to as “Self-Forming Actions.” This is contrasted with psychiatrist Sean Spence who believes that we have the ability to exert free will during optimal moments and not while in crisis. Sapolsky collectively criticizes these arguments by noting "Was was once now.” It is as if to say that while your neurons are currently functioning within their neuronal network and in the context of hormones, brain development, genetics, and so on, you can somehow step outside all of this. There are no floating turtles.
Studies by neuroscientist Josh Greene have illuminated neurobiological explanations for "doing the harder thing." Greene’s studies stick subjects in a brain scanner and have them play repeated rounds of a chance game that has a 50% success rate. Subjects are told that there is a glitch in the system and they cannot enter their guess and instead they can report if they were wrong or right. By repeating this process enough times you can tell if someone is telling the truth if their average success rate is about 50%. When the opportunity for temptation arises, there is a large activation of the PFC, which corresponds with a person wrestling with whether to cheat. What about people that do not cheat? With these individuals, there is no activation of the PFC.; for these people, not cheating is reflexive. As stated by Greene, rather than with standing temptation due to "will," this is a state of "grace." To summarize the words of Sapolsky, “Doing the right thing is not the harder thing." But what if your PFC is impaired? A substantial percentage of people incarcerated for violent crime have a history of concussive head trauma to the PFC. 20,21 Roughly half the people incarcerated for violent antisocial crimes have a history of TBI opposed to 8% of the general population.
One stark demonstration of the fallibility of PFC function is a study of judges overseeing over 1000 parole board decisions. Whether a judge granted someone parole versus more jail time was best predicted by how long it had been since they had eaten a meal. There was a roughly 65% chance of parole if the judge recently had a meal while there was a close to 0% chance if it had been a few hours.22 Sapolsky summaries with the following:
“(a) grit, character, backbone, tenacity, strong moral compass, willing spirit winning out over weak flesh, are all produced by the PFC; (b) the PFC is made of biological stuff identical to the rest of your brain; (c) your current PFC is the outcome of all that uncontrollable biology interacting with all that uncontrollable environment.”
Chaos Theory
Sapolsky addresses three revolutions that numerous thinkers use to support the existence of free will. The first is chaos theory. The central idea of chaos theory is that certain complicated systems cannot be understood on a reductive level. With chaotic systems, you cannot take a reductive approach by breaking down a starting state into component parts and predict the result.
An important component of chaos theory is the concept of “sensitive dependence on initial conditions”: with nonlinear systems, small differences in a starting state can cause huge differences between time points. Stated another way, a tiny difference in a starting state can magnify unpredictably over time. This is well represented by the butterfly effect. Similarly, knowing the present state of a system does not allow you predictive power as to what the starting state was given that it could have arisen from multiple starting states.
The opportunity for seeming lack of predictability is one way that individuals use to prove the existence of free will although Sapolsky notes that even if there is determinism in chaos, it does not help you prove the existence of free will. He further states that even if chaoticism is unpredictable, it is still deterministic. The important distinction is that determinism allows you to explain why something happened while predictability allows you to say what will happen next. Stated another way, chaos theory is "deterministically unpredictable."
Another way that chaos theory is used to prove the existence of free will is through the idea of convergence. Analytic philosophers refer to this phenomenon as over-determination: when different pathways have separately progressed to the same outcome. So, if multiple paths lead to a single system state, and you pause that known state in time, you cannot determine which particular path led to that state (because there are multiple). The ability to rule out every possible cause until you get down to the root cause is called radical eliminative reductionism. Some argue that if you cannot say what caused an event, then you cannot rule-out indeterminism and therefore free will. But, as Sapolsky notes, chaotic convergence only undermines radical reductionism but not determinism: “Just because you can’t tell which of two towers of turtles propping you up goes all the way down doesn’t mean that you’re floating in air.”
Emergent Complexity
“In the face of complicated things, our intuitions beg us to fill up what we do not understand, even can never understand, with mistaken attributions."
Emergent complexity is a result of simple elements that spontaneously self assemble with often shockingly complex results. With enough quantity, extraordinary quality emerges. Examples include ant colonies, honey bees, and slime molds that can predict the optimal placement of train stations as well as urban planners.
Sapolsky notes the following as necessary for emergent complexity:
“There is a huge number of ant-like elements, all identical are coming in just a few different types.
The "ant" has a very small repertoire of things they can do."
There are a few simple rules based on chance interactions with immediate neighbors (e.g., "walk with this pebble and your little ant mandibles until you bump into another and holding a pebble, in which case, drop yours"). No aunt knows more than these few rules, and each and Axis menton in this agent.
Out of the hugely complicated phenomena that can produce emerge irreducible properties that exist only went on the collective level (e.g., a single molecule of water cannot be wet; "wetness" average is only from the collectivity of water molecules, and studying single water molecules cannot predict much about wetness) and that are self-contained at the level of complexity (i.e., you can make accurate predictions about the behavior of the collective level without knowing much about the component parts). As summarized by Nobel laureate physicist Philip Anderson, "More is different."
These emergent properties are robust and resilient–a waterfall, for example, maintains consistent emergent features over time despite the fact that no water molecule precipitates and waterfall-ness more than once.
A detailed picture of the maturely emergent system can be (but is not necessarily) unpredictable, which should have echoes of the previous 2 chapters. Knowing the starting state and reproduction rules (a la cellular automata) gives you the means to develop the complexity but not the means to describe it. Or, to use the word offered by leading developmental neurobiologist of the past century, Paul Weiss, starting state can never contain "itinerary."
Part of this unpredictability is due to the fact that in emergent systems, the road you are traveling on is being constructed at the same time and, in fact, you are being on it is influencing the construction process by constituting feedback on the road-making process. Moreover, the goal you are traveling toward may not even exist yet–you are destined to interact with a target spot that may not exist yet but, with any luck, will be constricted in time. In addition, unlike last chapter’s cellular automata, emergent systems are also subjective randomness (jargon: "stochastic events"), where the sequence of random events makes a difference.
Often the emergent properties can be breathtakingly adaptive and, despite that, there is no blueprint or blueprint maker.”
A grossly simplified summary of emergent complexity is that the sum is greater than its component parts. The colony of bees is capable of many emergently complex phenomena that a single bee is not. Similarly, our brains are capable of many emergently complex phenomena that are not possible with single neurons or a single network of neurons working together. This sounds like a good opening for explaining the existence of free will; and indeed this is a segue for the work of philosopher Christian List who warns that looking at the world solely through the lens of physics or neuroscience may result in people mistakenly rejecting free will; a mistake caused by focusing on the non-emergent level. In his 2019 book, Why Free Will is Real List asserts that “Free will and its prerequisites are emergent, higher-level phenomena.”
Sapolsky suggests that there are three different ways in which people mistakenly link emergence and free will. The first occurs from ignoring sensitive dependence on initial conditions by stating that the same scenario can lead to different outcomes but this is only when the same scenario is not really the same and is a gross approximation. If the same scenario leading to different outcomes were real, it would prove emergent indeterminism.
The second is simple elements giving rise to emergent states that can do whatever they want. Examples include philosopher Walter Glannon who asserts that although our brains are responsible for generating and sustaining our mental states, they do not determine them and that individuals are capable of willing themselves through choices (i.e., persons are not identical to their brains). Neuroscientist Michael Shadlen asserts that emergent states are "orphan from the chain of cause and effect that lead to their implementation and neural machinery." Again Sapolsky notes, "You can be out of your mind but not out of your brain; no matter how emergently cool, ant colonies are still made of ants that are constrained by whatever individual ants can or can’t do, and brains are still made of brain cells that function like brain cells."
The last mistake concerns the idea that an emergent state can reach down and change the fundamental nature of the simple elements comprising it. This is the idea that building blocks work differently once they are part of something emergent. But as Sapolsky notes, “the whole point of emergence, the basis of its amazingness, is that those idiotically simple little building blocks that only know a few rules about interacting with their immediate neighbors remain precisely as idiotically simple when their building block collective is outperforming urban plan is with business cards." For example, despite emergent properties of the brain, neurons are not freed of their history once they become a part of a complex network.
Quantum Indeterminacy
As it so happens Laplacian determinism cannot explain certain phenomena at the subatomic level and the universe is not completely deterministic. Classical mechanics allows for precise calculations for macroscopic phenomena (e.g., calculating the three dimensional path, or trajectory, of a ball thrown in the air or a rocket being launched into space). Quantum mechanics flies in the face of classical mechanics and determinism.
Sapolsky discusses the wave particle duality of photons and electrons as well as the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle where the position and the momentum of a subatomic particle cannot simultaneously be measured; the exact location of an electron is indeterministic. Electrons are probabilistically found in certain regions of space called orbitals and are in multiple places simultaneously. Oddly, the process of measuring an electron’s position or velocity (and therefore momentum) leads to what is known as a collapse of the wave function transforming from a superposition of states (the electron being in many places simultaneously) to a single defined value (whatever it is that is being measured). The reason for the collapse of a wave function has never been determined. The collapse of the wave function also explains why Schrodinger's cat is simultaneously dead and alive until you look in the box.
Another instance of indeterminism on a microscopic scale is Brownian motion, which explains the random movement of particles suspended in a fluid or gas. Although Brownian motion is a microscopic phenomenon, it has multiple effects on biological systems. Brownian motion can help explain the distribution of populations of axon terminals, the production of the beta-amyloid peptide involved in Alzheimer’s disease, and why fertilized eggs never exactly divide 50:50, which has a major effect on identical twins.
Another instance of indeterminism is the idea of quantum entanglement. Two particles, even hundreds of miles apart, can become “entangled” and their properties such as spin (which has nothing to do with an electron actually spinning around; as a quantum mechanics professor once said, “chocolate” would have been an equally fitting name). When two particles are entangled, if you alter one particle, you alter the other and the change is simultaneous.
As if all of this was not strange enough, Sapolsky discusses quantum tunneling, which is illustrated by electrons being able to seemingly traverse physical spaces such as walls due to superposition. Quantum indeterminacy provides a lot of fodder for doubting the presence of free will. Maybe behavior is a product of the randomness of the previous ideas. Sapolsky ultimately argues against this. The idea of quantum effects bubbling up is considered through the work of Peter Tse with the neurotransmitter glutamate as well as the work of anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff and physicist Roger Penrose with microtubules. While a glutamatergic neuron has roughly 20-100 trillion glutamate receptors, it is unlikely that a little spontaneous release of glutamate can produce any meaningful effects. In addition, physicist Max Tegmark has shown that the time course of quantum states in microtubules is far too short to have a discernible biological effect. Although there is the potential for a staggering amount of subatomic indeterminacy, the major point is that it does not appear to manifest on the macroscopic level. If it did, Sapolsky notes that “you’d just be making gargly sounds because the muscles in your tongue would be doing all sorts of random things.” Interestingly, Sapolsky does not address string theory and the idea of multiple universes or the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.
Will We Run Amok?
“The theme of the second half of this book is this: We have done it before. Over and over, in various domains, we have shown that we can subtract out a belief that actions are freely, willfully chosen, as we become more knowledgeable, more reflective, more modern. And the roof has not caved in; society can function without her believing that people with epilepsy are in cahoots with Satan and that mothers of schizophrenics caused the disease by hating their child.”
Sapolsky examines the potential for a lack of belief in free will to cause society to run amok:
‘“Don’t blame me; I was possessed by Hatnu Belian, the evil tiger spirit of the forest” is just a hop, skip, and a jamp away from “Don’t blame me; we are just biological machines.”’
As previously explored by Drs. Puder and Hagele, when people believe that they have less free will, their overall behavior appears to be lousier in multiple domains: they become more antisocial, express less gratitude, put less effort into tasks, and monitor errors less closely. Although a 2022 meta-analysis demonstrated that while manipulating people subtly does lessen belief in free will and increase belief in determinism, it does not produce any consistent effects on ethical behavior.23
Sapolsky makes the parallel between atheism and determinism. It was previously thought, and is actually still believed in certain circles, that atheism will lead to immoral behavior. In fact, atheism is punishable by death or prison in 52 countries. Some US states have laws barring atheists from holding public office although these laws are not upheld due to a Supreme Court ruling.
Sapolsky maintains that on average, religious people are more concerned than atheists when maintaining a moral reputation. A large part of religion is about accountability and social desirability. According to Ara Norenzayan, of the University of British Columbia, it is only when societies grow large enough, that gods emerge that are concerned with human reality and punishment for our transgressions.24 Desert dwellers are more likely to be monotheistic, probably reflecting ecological influences. According to Sapolsky, these monotheistic desert dwellers are more effective conquerors, which helps explain why around 55% of humans are affiliated with a religion invented by Middle Eastern monotheistic shepherds.
Atheists are more likely to suffer from clinical depression. Sapolsky asserts that part of this is due to being a minority. Prosociality in religious people is boosted by religious primes while prosociality in atheists is boosted just as much by secular primes. One real world example of atheists who have not run amok is the Scandinavians who have experienced a steep decline in religiosity. Compared to the US, Scandinavian countries consistently fare better on quality of life. Sapolsky notes that correlation of course does not reflect causality but the point is that while there is concern for atheists running amok, the Scandinavian countries provide some doubt. Sapolsky concludes that collectively, studies in experimental settings have shown no difference in ethical behavior between atheists and theists and that once you control for sex, age, socioeconomic status, marital status, and sociality, the majority of differences between theists and atheists disappear.25
Change
Although it may appear otherwise, Sapolsky asserts that we do not change our minds, and that our minds, which are a product of our biology, are changed by circumstance. Our biology is inescapable. The mechanisms of our own neuronal function are the same as those seen in simpler organisms. Chapter 12 goes in depth about the biological mechanism of learning in the sea slug Aplysia californica, which won neuroscientist Eric Kandel a Nobel prize. We are composed of the same machinery for learning as Aplysia californica.
While change is of course possible, we do not freely choose to change. We are changed by the world around us. Attitudes do change and we have the ability to change the attitudes of others. In certain parts of Europe, men with epilepsy were castrated up until the 19th-century. Sapolsky views epilepsy as a model of change for attitudes about free will. There are multiple other historical instances of false attribution leading to stigmatization. One example is the idea of the schizophrenogenic mother proposed by psychoanalyst Fireda Fromm-Reichmann who argued that schizophrenia was caused by cold, distant mothers. We now know that schizophrenia is a biological disorder and not caused by distant parenting.
Absurdism 2.0
Absurdism is the philosophical theory that the universe is irrational and meaningless. Absurdism is often associated with the French-Algerian philosopher Albert Camus who in multiple works, including The Myth of Sisyphus, proposed embracing a cold, indifferent universe by the will to continue living and creating your own meaning. Camus argued that God does not exist, the universe is indifferent to your presence, and that there is no inherent meaning to life. Most people find these ideas pretty depressing.
It could be argued that Sapolksy’s hard determinism takes absurdism to a new level: not only is the universe irrational and meaningless, we are not even free to make our own decisions. We are automatons, but due to consciousness, we are stuck (according to him) with the illusion of agency. We have come to associate our will with a sense of agency: you are thirsty, so you decide to pour yourself a glass of water. Voila! Free will. But if Sapolsky is correct, we are simply observers: "We are not captains of our ship; our ships never had captains. Fuck. That really blows." We are basically Maggie Simpson believing that we are the one driving the car. If Sapolsky is correct, perhaps there is solace in that, for all of us, at least some of the time, our wills and our behaviors align creating a sense of agency and that is good enough. It is often helpful to act as if you have free will: consider all of your options and think deeply when you can, but do not be too hard on yourself because it really could not have been any other way.
What about the negative aspects of not addressing our lack of free will? Sapolsky advocates for criminal justice reform. No more punishment. Instead of prison, he refers to the work of philosopher Derek Perebroom who suggests a model analogous to the medical quarantine model. Extending the idea further, Gregg Caruso stresses the imperative of prevention and addressing the social determinants of criminal behavior. Sapolsky recognizes that punishment works to maintain cooperation. A major problem with our ability to give up on some forms of punishment is that retributive punishment activates the dopamine reward pathway; it feels good when people are punished.
While Sapolsky does not believe in free will, he often fails. He gets frustrated. He casts moral judgements. But all the same he suggests that we recognize there is no free will where it counts. There is no justifiable “deserve” and you are no more entitled to have your moral needs met than the next person. Hating a person for the way they act is no more absurd than hating the sky for storming.
For more see:
Episode 084: Free Will in Psychiatry & Psychotherapy Part 1
Episode 085: Free Will in Psychiatry & Psychotherapy Part 2
Episode 086: Free Will in Psychiatry & Psychotherapy Part 3
Episode 195: Dr. Robert Sapolsky: Baboons, Stress Research, Connection and Determinism
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