If we are not independent agents...

mynameisuntz

Then how can we have any sort of will? From my understanding, Buddhism rejects free will. But many Buddhists have suggested the idea of conditional will, or cause and effect. Even if this is the case, it implies some sense of personal "will" which we can use to adjust or mold the present/future. That is, we have some power or will over the planting of new karmic seeds which influence the present and future.

That is to say, we are at the mercy of context/past karmic seeds/present situations, but we also have some "freedom" to influence the present in conjunction with that uncontrollable context/past karmic seeds/present situations, as well as influencing the future based on the karmic seeds we plant now.

All of this is to ask: if Buddhism says we are not independent agents or doers, then how does conditional will work in the sense that we are influencing some sense of will?

RebeccaS

I think because of our karma, we only have limited options. So we're not "free" to do absolutely anything and everything, only make choices between the options we have available. Just my two cents

person

I think that the present moment also conditions our responses.

What exists in the present moment? Awareness.

So for example our conditioned response to a percieved slight is to get angry, anger appears in our awareness, depending upon the degree that one is practiced at watching and noticing what arises in the mind. That information along with any sort of philosophical or psychological learning we have can then give rise to a thought that you should act in a different manner.

There's probably more to it than that and this is just my opinion and current understanding, nothing authoritative.

Songhill

The Buddha is recorded to have said to a Brahmin who asserted that there is “no agency who is self or another.” To this the Buddha replied: “I have never heard or seen anything of the sort. When you move forward or backward, stand or sit or lie down, are you not using initiative? Well, isn’t that self-agency (attâkara)?” (A.iii.377)

kowtaaia

Just because choice is conditioned, doesn't mean that there isn't choice. Hopefully, conditioning chooses a pale blue shirt rather that a purple and orange one with yellow polka dots.

"But who, Venerable One, is it that feels?"
"This question is not proper," said the Exalted One.
I do not teach that there is one who feels.
If, however, the question is put thus:
'Conditioned through what does feeling arise?' then the answer will be 'Through sense impressions as a condition feeling [arises]; with feeling as a condition, craving [arises]."
--SN II 13

Sabre

As soon as you make a duality between 'you' and 'will' or 'you' and 'choice', you are going wrong. Will is there, but it is not controlled by anyone. Choices are there, but nobody chooses. Out of attachment to controlling things, some practitioners come up with some way to fiddle in some kind of fancy free will that is not totally free, but sort of still freeish...

Well, it's not like that. That freeish kind of thing also doesn't exist. You have no control.

mynameisuntz

Sabre said:

As soon as you make a duality between 'you' and 'will' or 'you' and 'choice', you are going wrong. Will is there, but it is not controlled by anyone. Choices are there, but nobody chooses. Out of attachment to controlling things, some practitioners come up with some way to fiddle in some kind of fancy free will that is not totally free, but sort of still freeish...

Well, it's not like that. That freeish kind of thing also doesn't exist. You have no control.

Haha, I wasn't trying to create that duality; just trying to speak as clearly as possible in layman's terms.

But still, it sounds like your answer coincides with determinism more than the conditional will I referred to before. But this could easily just be due to be misinterpreting.

SeaOfTranquility

You mean who is ultimately in control of me. I would have to say no body.

No one is driving the bus! It's OK. Return to your seat and enjoy the ride.

Decisions are made that give the illusion of free will or a separate agent making independent decisions. Actually, our thoughts are conditioned by what has preceded. Karma, And good luck finding this separate agent.

When we meditate we see thoughts and sensations arise and fall without anyone in control.. See their impermanent, unsatisfactory, no-self nature.

Best Wishes

mynameisuntz

SeaOfTranquility said:

You mean who is ultimately in control of me. I would have to say no body.

No one is driving the bus! It's OK. Return to your seat and enjoy the ride.

Decisions are made that give the illusion of free will or a separate agent making independent decisions. Actually, our thoughts are conditioned by what has preceded. Karma, And good luck finding this separate agent.

When we meditate we see thoughts and sensations arise and fall without anyone in control.. See their impermanent, unsatisfactory, no-self nature.

Best Wishes

I like this response, but it seems to negate the idea that there is any will at all. I'm certainly not a subscriber to free will, but rather "conditional will" as it was explained to me. That is, "we" have some control or influence on the way events unfold, but this control or influence happens within the confines of our past/uncontrollable circumstances/etc.

But what you are saying sounds more like determinism, where there is no control at any point in time. Is that what you're saying?

Jason

Here's my response from a similar thread you started back in April, just for the sake of discussion (and in case anyone else is interested):

It's an interesting question, and there are a wide range of opinions on the matter.

For example, from the conventional point of view, we definitely seem to have at least some level of functional choice via intention (cetana) operating within the broader framework of causality that conditions the choices available to us at any given point in time. As one erudite poster from dhammawheel.com put it:

Functional choice isn't independent of other causes and conditions — it operates within the same conditioned mind-stream. But it does operate, and it does so in consort with desire and attention, etc. Hence there is no need for Cartesian notions of free will or Upanisadic notions of a permanent, unchanging Self for there to be functional choice. In fact, these non-Buddhist systems are not sustainable precisely because of the interdependence of phenomena: i.e. an unchanging agent cannot engage in actions, etc.

This is somewhat similar to how many teachers approach the issue of free will, particularly from a predominately Sutta-based point of view, such as the Venerable Thanissaro, e.g.,:

In the course of his Awakening, the Buddha discovered that the experience of the present moment consists of three factors: results from past actions, present actions, and the results of present actions. This means that kamma acts in feedback loops, with the present moment being shaped both by past and by present actions; while present actions shape not only the present but also the future. This constant opening for present input into the causal processes shaping one's life makes free will possible. In fact, will — or intention — forms the essence of action. Furthermore, the quality of the intention determines the quality of the act and of its results. On the mundane level there are three types of intentions: skillful, leading to pleasant results; unskillful, leading to painful results; and mixed, leading to mixed results, all these results being experienced within the realm of space and time. However, the fact that the experience of space and time requires not only the results of past actions but also the input of present actions means that it is possible to unravel the experience of space and time by bringing the mind to a point of equilibrium where it contributes no intentions or actions to the present moment. The intentions that converge at this equilibrium are thus a fourth type of intention — transcendent skillful intentions — which lead to release from the results of mundane intentions, and ultimately to the ending of all action. (Introduction to the Itivuttaka)

For the early Buddhists, karma was non-linear. Other Indian schools believed that karma operated in a straight line, with actions from the past influencing the present, and present actions influencing the future. As a result, they saw little room for free will. Buddhists, however, saw that karma acts in feedback loops, with the present moment being shaped both by past and by present actions; present actions shape not only the future but also the present. This constant opening for present input into the causal process makes free will possible. This freedom is symbolized in the imagery the Buddhists used to explain the process: flowing water. Sometimes the flow from the past is so strong that little can be done except to stand fast, but there are also times when the flow is gentle enough to be diverted in almost any direction. ("Karma")

Although the precise working out of the kammic process is somewhat unpredictable, it is not chaotic. The relationship between kammic causes and their effects is entirely regular: when an action is of the sort that it will be felt in such and such a way, that is how its result will be experienced [§13]. Skillful intentions lead to favorable results, unskillful ones to unfavorable results. Thus, when one participates in the kammic process, one is at the mercy of a pattern that one's actions put into motion, but that is not entirely under one's present control. Despite the power of the mind, one cannot reshape the basic laws of cosmic causality at whim. These laws include the physical laws, within which one's kamma must ripen and work itself out. This is the point of passage [§14], in which the Buddha explains that present pain can be explained not only by past kamma but also by a host of other factors; the list of alternative factors he gives comes straight from the various causes for pain that were recognized in the medical treatises of his time. If we compare this list with his definition of old kamma in [§15], we see that many if not all of the alternative causes are actually the result of past actions. The point here is that old kamma does not override other causal factors operating in the universe — such as those recognized by the physical sciences — but instead finds its expression within them.

However, the fact that the kammic process relies on input from the present moment means that it is not totally deterministic. Input from the past may place restrictions on what can be done and known in any particular moment, but the allowance for new input from the present provides some room for free will. This allowance also opens the possibility for escape from the cycle of kamma altogether by means of the fourth type of kamma: the development of heightened skillfulness through the pursuit of the seven factors for Awakening and the noble eightfold path — and, by extension, all of the Wings to Awakening [§§16-17].

The non-linearity of this/that conditionality explains why heightened skillfulness, when focused on the present moment, can succeed in leading to the end of the kamma that has formed the experience of the entire cosmos. All non-linear processes exhibit what is called scale invariance, which means that the behavior of the process on any one scale is similar to its behavior on smaller or larger scales. To understand, say, the large-scale pattern of a particular non-linear process, one need only focus on its behavior on a smaller scale that is easier to observe, and one will see the same pattern at work. In the case of kamma, one need only focus on the process of kamma in the immediate present, in the course of developing heightened skillfulness, and the large-scale issues over the expanses of space and time will become clear as one gains release from them. (Wings to Awakening)

This view is based on a very simplistic understanding of fabricated reality, seeing causality as linear and totally predictable: X causes Y which causes Z and so on, with no effects turning around to condition their causes, and no possible way of using causality to escape from the causal network. However, one of the many things the Buddha discovered in the course of his awakening was that causality is not linear. The experience of the present is shaped both by actions in the present and by actions in the past. Actions in the present shape both the present and the future. The results of past and present actions continually interact. Thus there is always room for new input into the system, which gives scope for free will. There is also room for the many feedback loops that make experience so thoroughly complex, and that are so intriguingly described in chaos theory. Reality doesn't resemble a simple line or circle. It's more like the bizarre trajectories of a strange attractor or a Mandelbrot set. ("Samsara Divided by Zero")

And I think this approach to the issue is especially helpful from a pragmatic standpoint when it comes to the practice itself.

Jason

Continued:

On a deeper, more theoretical level, however, one might ask how volition/intention/will/etc. is possible without a self, especially when it's argued that there must be some kind active agency for free will to exist. This, of course, conflicts with the Abhidhammic position, which labels volition (cetana) as one of the 52 mental factors "common to all classes of consciousness," but rejects the existence of any kind of self or independent agency whatsoever.

It seems like a paradox, but only from the Western philosophical idea of 'free will.' Classical Theravada, on the other hand, views free will more or less as an illusion, and instead takes a more casually determined view of volition.

Conventionally speaking, we appear to have functional choice via intention operating within a broader framework of causality that conditions the choices available to us at any given time. However, on a deeper level, intention itself is a product of the aggregate of mental formations (sankhara-khandha). Therefore, being a product or process within one of the aggregates, which themselves are types of processes and not-self (anatta), this type of internal decision maker or will-to-do, if you will, has its own requisite conditions and is also not-self, since whatever is conditioned and subject to change can't be said to have an unchanging essence or being.

In essence, volition itself isn't an illusion, it's simply not the result of an independent agent or self; and it, like everything else in the world, is ultimately the result of causally determined processes. True free will requires an independent agent, and Buddhism effectively rejects such an agency. And while I tend to take a more moderate position myself, Buddhism is entirely compatible with causal determinism.

For example, Dhammanando Bhikkhu once gave me the example of a mosquito biting you on the nose: first you feel annoyed and want to squash it, but then you recall that you're a precept-observing Buddhist and so restrain yourself.

He explained that when this event is described in conventional terms, or according to the Sutta method, it might be said that you had a choice to kill the mosquito or to refrain, and that you chose the latter. But when it's described according to the Abhidhamma method, your abstention from killing wasn't due to choice but to the arising of kusala cetasikas (wholesome mental factors) such as moral shame and fear of wrong-doing (hiri & ottappa), and abstinence (virati), i.e., it was causally determined.

And then there are passages like this from the Dhammasangani (pp. 7-8):

What on that occasion is volition (cetana)? The volition, purpose, purposefulness, which is born of contact with the appropriate element of representative intellection - that is the volition that there then is.

And the Atthasalini, pp.147-148:

Volition is that which co-ordinates, that is, it binds closely (abhisandahati) to itself associated states as objects. This is its characteristic; its function is conation. There is no such thing as volition in the four planes of existence without the characteristic of co-ordinating; all volition has it. But the function of conation is only in moral and immoral states; as regards activity in moral and immoral acts, the remaining associated states play only a restricted part. But volition is exceedingly energetic. It makes double effort, double exertion. Hence the Ancients said: 'Volition is like the nature of a landowner, a cultivator who, taking fifty-five strong men, went down to the fields to reap. He was exceedingly energetic and exceedingly strenuous; he doubled his strength, he doubled his effort, and said, "Take your sickles," and so forth, pointed out the portion to be reaped, offered them drink, food, scent, flowers, etc., and took an equal share of the work.' Volition is like the cultivator; the fifty-five moral states which arise as factors of consciousness are like the fifty-five strong men; like the time of doubling strength, doubling effort by the cultivator is the doubled strength, double effort of volition as regards activity in moral and immoral acts. Thus should conation as its function be understood.

It has directing as manifestation. It arises directing associated states, like the chief disciple, the chief carpenter, etc., who fulfil their own and others' duties... even so, when volition starts work on its object, it sets associated states to do each its own work. For when it puts forth energy, they also put forth energy... It is also evident that it arises by causing associated states to be energetic in such things as recollecting an urgent work and so forth.

Incidentally, I think the Abhidhammic position accords well with what neuroscientist Sam Harris writes about the illusion of free will here, here and here. And even in the Suttas, there are teachings that evidence elements of casual determinism, lending support to the Abhidhammic position. I find AN 11.2 interesting, for example, in that it seems to show how certain wholesome mental factors (kusala cetasikas) condition certain wholesome qualities and experiences.

In the end, however, I don't feel that I'll ever have a satisfactory understanding of the issue; but I do see how each view can be useful depending upon where one is along the path, and what tools will be the most effective at that stage. Ultimately, the Buddha's approach to life's problems is pragmatic, serving a practical purpose that's subjectively beneficial regardless of their objective validity, and I think that point should always be kept in mind unless one becomes hopelessly lost within the proverbial 'thicket of views.'

mynameisuntz

Thank you for stopping by, Jason! Glad you remembered my first thread on this topic. I want to talk more about the following:

"In essence, volition itself isn't an illusion, it's simply not the result of an independent agent or self; and it, like everything else in the world, is ultimately the result of causally determined processes. True free will requires an independent agent, and Buddhism effectively rejects such an agency. And while I tend to take a more moderate position myself, Buddhism is entirely compatible with causal determinism. "

How can volition be volition at all if it is a result of causally determined processes outside of ourselves (as there is no independent agent/self)? Wouldn't the very definition of "volition" imply that there is a part of "me" influencing the present/future?

And if there is no agent or self, and as such volition is the result of causally determined processes, then does that imply that we cannot accept blame or praise for our actions? Do we have any role in planting karmic seeds? Or are they planted by causally determined processes outside of our control?

Please tell me if I am way off here. It certainly would not be the first time! As always, thank you for your insight.

Songhill

mynameisuntz:

Then how can we have any sort of will? From my understanding, Buddhism rejects free will.

Just curious, where did you learn that Buddhism rejects free will?

In the Abhidharmasamuccaya, I am reading that "cultivation (bhâvanâ) concerns will (chanda), vigor (virya), effort (vyayama), perservance (utsaha), energetic action (utsudhi), non-stalling (aprativani), mindfulness (smriti), awareness (samprajanya) and dilligence (apramada)."

It goes without saying that one has to choose between going with cultivation, and all it implies, and hanging out at a bar with the guys drinking beer and drooling over babes.

Sabre

mynameisuntz said:

Sabre said:

As soon as you make a duality between 'you' and 'will' or 'you' and 'choice', you are going wrong. Will is there, but it is not controlled by anyone. Choices are there, but nobody chooses. Out of attachment to controlling things, some practitioners come up with some way to fiddle in some kind of fancy free will that is not totally free, but sort of still freeish...

Well, it's not like that. That freeish kind of thing also doesn't exist. You have no control.

Haha, I wasn't trying to create that duality; just trying to speak as clearly as possible in layman's terms.

But still, it sounds like your answer coincides with determinism more than the conditional will I referred to before. But this could easily just be due to be misinterpreting.

You were inferring some "freedom" anyway

In your other topic I explained how determinism and free will are not opposites. But that's mainly philosophy. For our experience it doesn't really matter. If things happen determined or partly by chance is not interesting, the interesting thing is that there is no self. It doesn't matter if things are determined or not.

The will is perfectly able to work on its own without any agent or controller involved. But probably in your experience the link between 'will' and 'freedom' or 'self' is so ingrained that you can't yet see this. But you won't philosophize your way through it. It is in deep meditation that it's more and more obvious there is no free will; the mind just does things on its own. So if you really want to know, take your meditation to the next level

With metta,
Sabre

Cloud

Things seem one way when we're still separating ourselves into self/other, and are another way in the reality where there are no independent entities to begin with. Who has or does not have free will? We're still talking about conventional reality, delusional reality. Obviously we can and do make choices; it doesn't matter whether the reality is determinism or not, since the level we function at is one of conscious choice. It's best, as @Sabre says, to meditate to realize the truth.

Jason

mynameisuntz said:

Thank you for stopping by, Jason! Glad you remembered my first thread on this topic. I want to talk more about the following:

"In essence, volition itself isn't an illusion, it's simply not the result of an independent agent or self; and it, like everything else in the world, is ultimately the result of causally determined processes. True free will requires an independent agent, and Buddhism effectively rejects such an agency. And while I tend to take a more moderate position myself, Buddhism is entirely compatible with causal determinism. "

How can volition be volition at all if it is a result of causally determined processes outside of ourselves (as there is no independent agent/self)? Wouldn't the very definition of "volition" imply that there is a part of "me" influencing the present/future?

And if there is no agent or self, and as such volition is the result of causally determined processes, then does that imply that we cannot accept blame or praise for our actions? Do we have any role in planting karmic seeds? Or are they planted by causally determined processes outside of our control?

Please tell me if I am way off here. It certainly would not be the first time! As always, thank you for your insight.

Some intriguing questions, but ones that I don't think will ever be answered to your satisfaction, at least not by me since I don't know the answers and must fall back on a type of Pascal's Wager in the end.

It may be, as some believe or intuit from personal experience, that there is a type of self or agency that's independent of the aggregates (which are impermanent and not-self) and responsible for volition but simply obscured by our attachment to them. But if there is, I can't describe it because such as self lies beyond the range of my experience and understanding.

And if there isn't, then explaining how volition works is tedious business, with a myriad of causes and conditions, both internal and external, past and present, continually combining to create an ever changing set of circumstances that go into our experience of the present moment, and every answer will simply lead to more questions and moral dilemmas that I don't have the time or skill to answer.

All I can say is that, if free will is ultimately an illusion, from the conventional point of view, there are still beings who act, experience the results of their actions, and are responsible for their actions even if their actions are causally determined (something Sam Harris discusses in his book, Free Will). And the more we understand this process, the more we can possibly (and somewhat paradoxically) condition our own freedom from suffering via a contemplative path that removes the fog of ignorance and attachment from our mind.

And if there is free will and a difficult-to-find self responsible for it, then we might eventually discover it by following a contemplative path that removes the fog of ignorance and attachment from our mind.