Free Will, Soul and Faith
In a religion that doesn’t make sense
Before I begin, I would like to apologise to any this article might offend. Try to understand even if you don’t agree; as a Christian I try to look at life honsetly and not to hide from the nitty-gritty facts which Scientific research reveals, and which don’t slot in with my understanding of life.
I have always believed Science and Religion should, and do, go hand in hand. Accepting evolution as God’s design plan, whilst the Adam and Eve story is of spritual value rather than historical, is no problem for me.
Discovering the Bible isn’t totally infallible and without contradiction, again doesn’t shake my belief in God or Christianity. What does shake my faith is scientific discovery about the way the brain, and with it the mind, works. It shakes my faith because it makes a mockery of my belief in soul and “freewill”.
Most people accept that our brains are responsible for, and control, our movement, senses, language, memory and intelligence. But suggest to people that the brain controls thinking, decision making and implicitly “freewill” and you start to hit nerves. People simply do not like to entertain such ideas — it takes away their individuality; they fear such ideas will reduce them to predictable machines. People prefer to believe in spiritual concepts such as soul and freewill, quite separate from the physical world which by some sort of meta-physical magic cause effects in the physical operation of the brain. Our freewill is above and distinct from the decision making of animals because we have another spiritual property — the conscience, the knowledge of good and bad.
So far straightforward — our freewill is spiritual, not material, not of the brain. Nice theory. Snug.
So why then does our freewill become impaired by physical effects on the brain such as: drinking alcohol (voluntary or otherwise), taking of drugs, diet deficiencies, chemical infection and brain diseases such as senile dementia or schizophrenia? Surely doesn’t this point towards our decision making as a product of the brain?
Human beings are NOT the only animals which exhibit behaviour we would call evil. Chimpanzees wage tribal wars on each other so we can fairly say “sin” probably existed before man developed.
Indeed, good and bad could be described as models the brain uses for survival strategies. Putting it crudely, helping others, loving and cooperation help the species grow as a community — it is good; killing, selfishness and deceit break the community into small, less effective segments, decreasing the survival prospects — it is bad.
Finally, what do we mean by soul? What is it responsible for? Not intelligence — this is a product of our environment and genes. Similarly creativity — you will find artistic parents will tend to have artistic children. Besides, if all people are created equal, how then are some more clever or creative than others?
Is the soul responsible for our emotions such as anger, hate, love etc? People can become angry more quickly through physical effects such as hunger, physical exhaustion and alcohol. Other physical effects, such as those mentioned before for freewill, can also affect the way people feel.
I believe it perfectly possible that people could evolve from DNA and to behave, make “moral” decisions, “feel”, love, create religion and science just like us, without the need for a soul or some spiritual, non-deterministic freewill. The difference to an external observer and indeed to themselves would be indistinguishable.
Belief in soul creates unnecessary problems. If you believe in evolution as God’s creation plan, then if the first “life-forms” had no soul (ie self-replicating molecules) then when did soul become linked with life forms? At what point in evolution did the offspring of parents suddenly develop a soul? If we say soul evolved gradually with evolution then what on earth constitutes a fully mature soul and what say a partially developed 37% soul? When does a soul enter the body of a developing baby? Is it really at conception? Because many fertilised ova fail to become implanted in the womb, which would imply, due to natural causes, millions of people would never get a chance of an earthly life.
Don’t say it’s not important, we’ll never know and can’t understand the answers to such questions. The brain will not remain a mysterious black box forever; brain and mind research is growing fast of recent years and shows no signs of stopping. If our religion is worth anything and we wish to show the validity of it to people who understand the way our brains work, we will have to come to terms with such new knowledge and try to work out how it fits in with our religion. We are not going to convert any of them if what we preach of free will contradicts scientific fact. I say this, because to me, I can’t see how they do agree.
Don’t misunderstand me. I am still a Christian. My belief in God is very strong and I believe in the revelation of God through Christ. I still believe in freewill and I still believe in soul — only they don’t make sense to me any more; I can’t understand how they operate or why they are necessary. Maybe I just believe in them because I’m afraid of the implications it would make to my religion if we had no soul, and freewill/decision making was merely the result of chemical reactions.
I can’t believe in existence without a God. I believe I feel God’s presence and see him in the world around me. I believe in an afterlife — the spirit of my grandfather came and talked to me. But if all my experiences are simply the result of a physical process in the brain they cannot be relied upon as the objective truth. I love God, feel utterly confused, accept scientific explanation of the brain as God’s design and put my faith and trust in him. Stupid isn’t it?
Suggested reading for mature Christians who can handle this sort of subject: Colin Blakemore, “The Mind Machine”, BBC Publications.