|
|
|
Baumeister on freewillBaumeister on freewillWhere has your willpower gone Roy Baumeister, Florida State University New Scientist, 28 January 2012 INTRODUCTION: It is quite encouraging to find Baumeister writing on free will or self control in a popular science magazine, given that as a psychologist, he is a long way from the mainstream's reliance on a simplistic interpretation of the Libet experiments. Although the article is given a rather reductionist spin, stressing that will power is driven by glucose based energy, its arguments are fatal for the deterministic establishment view as to the non-existence of free will. In contrast to the mainstream view that there is no such thing as free will, with unconscious and deterministic computations responsible for all human actions and behaviour, Baumeister argues that free will or self control requires energy, and is therefore part of the physical processing of the brain, rather than an illusion as the mainstream would have it. P. Baumeister states that research demonstrates that when subjects have had to exert self control, they perform poorly on a subsequent test of self control. It is argued that energy is depleted by the first exercise of self control leaving less available for the second attempt. In one such test, subjects were left next to a table with chocolate biscuits, which they were not supposed to eat. Some of the subjects succumbed to temptation and ate the biscuits. Subsequently, both the subjects who had succumbed and those who had resisted attempted a puzzle, which unbeknown to them was unsolvable. Those who had resisted the biscuit temptation gave up sooner on the puzzle, suggesting that their mental energy had been depleted by the effort of resisting temptation. In this context, will power is compared to a muscle that can tire, although its full energy can return after a period of recuperation. Baumeister proposes that the energy driving will power is ultimately based on glucose that is the basis of neurotransmitters instructing axons to fire. A meta-analysis performed in 2010 showed that as in the tests mentioned earlier, subjects' performance deteriorated between a first and second self control test. However subjects dosed with glucose after the first test performed well on the second test. |
| Email: quantum-mind@blueyonder.co.uk Copyright © Quantum Mind 2012. Web design by 7Soft.co.uk. |