Putting Ourselves Back in the Equation

Ultimately, we have no free will, because we aren’t outside the chain of cause and effect and randomness, as others have explained in more detail. But we do have something you might arguably call “proximate free will,” in that what I referred to as the “decision-making parts of our brains” are evolved psychological mechanisms that are like algorith... See more

Complexity – A typical complex system is composed of myriad individual constituents or agents that once aggregated take on collective characteristics that are usually not manifested in, nor could easily be predicted from, the properties of the individual components themselves. For example, you are much more than the totality of your cells and, simi... See more

“Do we have enough oxygen going to the leg muscles to support this activity?” while in tandem, another part sends down an order to increase respiration levels so that blood oxygenation is increased. A third part that is monitoring activity makes sure that the respiration increase was carried out per instructions and reports back if it wasn’t. Most

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"There is no one way the mind works, because the mind is not one thing. Instead, the mind has parts, and the different parts of the mind operate in different ways: Seeing a color works differently than planning a vacation, which works differently than understanding a sentence, moving a limb, remembering a fact, or feeling an emotion.” Trying to squ... See more