Sam Harris Free Will Summary

643 Words3 Pages
Philosopher Sam Harris challenges the ideals of free will, which is the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate. Harris in his book titled “Free Will” believes that free will is no such thing, in fact he even called it an illusion stating that “free will is a totally incoherent idea that contradicts what science tells us about how the world works. (Pardi)” Harris argues that “everything a person would need to really make a free choice—access to everything that gives rise to the choice and complete control over those things—doesn’t happen. (Horgan)” He believes that since not all action is completely free, and that the term free will is used as a misconception. His claims that the existence of free will isn’t real and that all decisions aren’t made freely became derived from his ideas that all decisions are created from past experiences, as well as, the environment an individual is in. What made Harris a firm believer in the abolition of free will was a study conducted in the 1980’s by Benjamin Libet, a Physiologist who during EEG experiments found out that decisions in the brain are already made before the conscious becomes aware of them. The conscious is supposed to be where…show more content…
Without thinking, you turn on the light immediately so that it is easier to find your phone and not trip over an object in the dark. Something had to drive you to turn on that light, maybe a past experience of tripping in the dark? By taking the past experience of tripping in the dark an individual will turn on the light the next time they encounter that predicament not because of free will but because past events showed them what happens when not taking the precaution. So this idea that free will doesn’t exist would support Harris’s claim that decisions are created from past experiences and

    More about Sam Harris Free Will Summary

      Open Document