The Right Winger’s Guide To Free Will

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part 1: The Valid and Invalid Positions On Free Will

Part 2: The Three Big Arguments for the Existence of Free Will

Part 3: Why Right Wingers Need Free Will

Part 4: Unifying Free Will and Hereditarianism

Conclusion

Citations

Introduction

The following is a four part essay that can serve as a definitive guide to free will for those wishing to enact a right wing agenda. This essay is attempting to construct the absolute deepest level foundations of right wing conservatism. A belief in free will is absolutely foundational for an effective right wing philosophy. Very often people arrive at right wing beliefs from pure intuition of what is right and what is wrong, thus the foundations of conservatism are very often neglected. For those of us who are not content with just the rightness of our own hearts and minds, but desire to correct the wrongness of the hearts and minds of others, it is necessary to have a complete and secular philosophical framework from which to argue our position. To not have such is a weakness because not only does it open your beliefs to allegations of reactionary dogmatism and anti-intellectualism, but it also drives those who have an intellectual appetite – the people we most want on our side – into the arms of the opposition.

The first part of this essay will define the terms associated with free will. People tend to overcomplicate free will but it is actually quite simple when broken down provided you are using correct definitions. The different positions on free will will be enumerated. They are determined by the combination of answers given to three questions: “Does Free Will Exist?”, “Is the universe Deterministic or Indeterministic?”, and “Is Free Will compatible with a Deterministic and/or Indeterministic universe?”. Using a logical condition created by the definitions, it is shown which positions are valid and it is shown that most of the possible combinations are logically invalid. Among the invalid positions on free will are all those which fall under the umbrella of compatibilism: the incorrect belief that free will is compatible with determinism.

The first part establishes the valid positions on free will which include both positions that affirm the existence of free will and those that deny it. The second part of this essay will argue in favor of the existence of free will. It is split into three big arguments. The first is the Scientific Argument. Scientific thinking leads one to believe in free will and that denial of free will violates the underlying principles of the philosophy of science. The second is the Undeniable Mysteries argument which refutes the idea that free will is too mysterious to exist by referencing the two mysteries which undeniably exist. Those are consciousness and the existence of the universe itself. The final argument is the Integrated Psyche argument which argues that consciousness cannot exist without free will. Far from free will being an illogical construct, it is the consciousness without free will posited by free will deniers which is nonsensical.

The third part of this essay will explain why free will is needed in the philosophy of conservatism. I will explain why conservatism needs moral responsibility and why a denial of free will is inherently nihilistic. The theories of criminal justice will be explored to show what kind of consequences you get without free will. The nature of leftism will be described. Leftism is the politics of equality. Free will is one of the tools needed to combat leftism. Another tool is hereditarianism. Hereditarianism is very useful but it is insufficient on its own to completely counter leftism. I will show the synergistic power of combining hereditarianism with free will.

In the fourth and final part of this essay, I will explain hereditarianism. It is the belief, with scientific evidence, that much of human inequality stems from genetic differences between people. Hereditarianism is the current vanguard of right wing thought. The main focus of hereditarianism for conservatives is this question of Race and IQ. I will cover the conventional model of heredity. I will briefly go over why the objections given by the critics of hereditarianism are wrong. My own objection will be elaborated. My objection is the conventional model is not compatible with free will. My objection is not that the model is not useful, it is useful, but that it is not a true representation of reality. I will introduce what I call the Predisposition Function Collapse Theory of free will or PFC theory. Using PFC theory I will create my own model of how phenotype works which unifies free will and hereditarianism thus fixing the foundations of right wing conservatism.

Part 1: The Valid and Invalid Positions on Free Will

There are a large variety of different positions taken on the joint question of free will and determinism, often idiosyncratic and frustratingly noncommittal positions. Upon a rigorous analysis many of these positions are found to be nonsensical and logically invalid. The discourse surrounding free will and determinism is very muddled and full of people talking past each other. This is in large part caused by explicit or implicit use of highly flawed definitions. In order to untangle this mess one must introduce some analytic philosophy. The correct definitions, which will be contrasted with common flawed definitions, are as follows:

• Free Will: the ability to make choices that are not causally determined by factors outside of one’s control

• Deterministic Universe: A universe whose every future state at time t>0 can in principle be calculated by its initial state at time t=0

• Indeterministic Universe: A universe whose every future state at time t>0 can not in principle be calculated by its initial state at time t=0

• Free Will is Compatible with a(n) Deterministic/Indeterministic Universe: there exists a hypothetical universe of this type, not necessarily the universe we inhabit, that can accommodate free will

With these definitions in hand we can begin an analysis in formal logic on the question of free will and determinism. There are three questions. The different combinations of three answers determines what your position is. Those questions and answers are:

1. Does Free Will Exist?

   a. Yes

   b. No

2. Is the universe Deterministic or Indeterministic?

   a. Deterministic

   b. Indeterministic with only probabilistic indeterminism

   c. Indeterministic with only non probabilistic indeterminism

   d. Indeterministic with both probabilistic and non probabilistic indeterminism

3. Is Free Will compatible with a Deterministic and/or Indeterministic universe?

   a. Compatible with both

   b. Compatible with only Deterministic

   c. Compatible with only Indeterministic

   d. Compatible with neither

The answers within each question are mutually exclusive to one another and are exhaustive. There are a total of 32 possible positions. When the definitions are analyzed one concludes that a valid position must satisfy a specific condition: the existence of free will bidirectionally implies the existence of non probabilistic determinism(bidirectional meaning the existence of non probabilistic determinism also implies the existence of free will). In logical notation: 1a ↔ (2c ∨ 2d) where 2c and 2d are mutually exclusive. The answers to question 3 can be restated in terms of the answers to questions 1 and 2 and the only answer which satisfies the condition is 3c. 3a states that free will is compatible with either a deterministic or indeterministic universe. In logical terms: 1a does not imply any subset in 2 that does not include both 2a and at least one from {2b, 2c, 2d}(the existence of free will does not imply either only a deterministic universe or only an indeterministic universe). 1a → (2c ∨ 2d) is true therefore 3a is false. 3b states that 1a → 2a(the existence of free will implies a deterministic universe). This is false because 1a → (2c ∨ 2d) is true and all the answers to 2 are mutually exclusive. 3c states that 1a → (2b ∨ 2c ∨ 2d)(free will implies an indeterministic universe). This is true. 3d states that 1a → ¬(2a ∨ 2b ∨ 2c ∨ 2d)(free will implies the universe is neither deterministic nor indeterministic). This is false because it too violates the condition. It is doubly false because the different universes in question 2 are an exhaustive list of all universes. 3d states that the existence of free will implies that the universe does not exist which is nonsense.

Among the 32 positions there are only 4 valid positions: 1a2c3c, 1a2d3c, 1b2a3c, and 1b2b3c. In addition you could be an agnostic between any combination of the 4 valid positions. I will show why the remaining positions are invalid. For the purposes of right wing conservatism your answer to 1(Does Free Will Exist?) must be ‘a’(Yes) but it makes no difference if your answer to 2(Is the universe Deterministic or Indeterministic?) is c(Indeterministic with only non probabilistic indeterminism), d(Indeterministic with both probabilistic and non probabilistic indeterminism), or agnostic. Within these valid positions those who answer 1a(free will does exist) would typically be called “libertarians” and are said to believe in “libertarian free will” (which is in fact the only kind of free will). Those who answer 1b(free will does not exist) are called skeptics or deniers. Part 2 presents the three big arguments in favor of 1a over 1b assuming otherwise valid positions.

These four valid positions correspond to four different types of universes. 1a2c3c represents a Type 1 universe where there is no probabilistic indeterminism. In a Type 1 universe either quantum mechanics is the basis for free will and subatomic particles are exercising free will, i.e. panpsychism, or quantum mechanics is deterministic and our indeterministic free will comes from some other mechanism. 1a2d3c is a Type 2 universe where probabilistic and non probabilistic indeterminism exist in conjunction. 1b2a3c is a Type 3 universe which is deterministic and free will does not exist. In 1b2b3c, a Type 4 universe, probabilistic indeterminism does exist but free will does not.

Why exactly is this condition 1a ↔ (2c ∨ 2d) true? It follows from how we defined our terms. Free will is defined as the ability to make choices that are not causally determined by factors outside one’s control. The factors in one’s control are mental factors. In other words, free will is the proposition that our choices causally originate from within the mind. This definition(either exactly or phrased in some other way) is the correct definition because it directly relates to the philosophical implications of free will that everyone is interested in, i.e. we have moral responsibility for our choices and our choices, and by extension our lives, have meaning.

Determined factors are outside of one’s control. A choice that is not determined by factors outside of our control is by definition an indeterministic process. Additionally, probabilistic indeterminism is by definition outside of one’s control, therefore free will is a source of non probabilistic indeterminism. The only types of universes that can accommodate free will are the ones that feature non probabilistic indeterminism, i.e. a Type 1 or Type 2 universe. In the other direction, the existence of non probabilistic indeterminism also implies the existence of free will. If a non probabilistic indeterminate event occurs, how is the actual outcome brought about from the range of possible outcomes? It must have been willed into existence. Because the possible outcomes did not exist as a probability distribution, a free will – the thing that can make choices not determined by external factors – is the only conceivable thing that could have brought about such an event.

Provided people give the correct answer to question 3, 3c(compatible with only indeterminism), it is very likely that they are using the correct definitions and it is very likely they have a valid position. The main errors that cause one to have an invalid position involve answering 3 incorrectly. The answer 3a(free will is compatible with both) is premised on an incorrect definition of free will. The answer 3d(free will is compatible with neither) is based on an incorrect definition of compatibility. The answer 3b(free will is only compatible with a deterministic universe) is based on incorrect definitions of both.

People who answer 3a(free will is compatible with both determinism and indeterminism) are called compatibilists. In a deterministic universe the future can be calculated from its initial conditions which logically implies that our choices are determined by factors outside of our control. With proper definitions, compatibilism is a simple conflict of terms. Instead of the correct definition, they typically define free will as “the ability to have done otherwise” or perhaps “the feeling of choice”. The former definition is called the principle of alternate possibilities. Compatibilists think that free will is compatible with determinism, but if they use this definition based on alternate possibilities they run into a problem. If the universe is deterministic that means you can not have done otherwise. They get around this and justify the compatibility with the irritating argument of counterfactual conditionals: “You could have done differently if the initial conditions were different”. Of course, the reason people are concerned about free will is because of its wide ranging philosophical implications. These trite observations that people have the feeling of choice and that deterministic people can do otherwise provided the initial conditions are different are things which everyone already agrees with and are entirely irrelevant as to the philosophical implications and essence of the free will question.

You can avoid making the same error as compatibilists if you use the correct definition of free will. “The ability to make choices not causally determined by factors outside of one’s control” and “the ability to have done otherwise” are highly overlapping but they are not identical. The situation where a different set of initial conditions cause someone to act differently in a deterministic universe does not satisfy the correct definition of free will. Let us call the original initial conditions scenario 1 and the altered conditions scenario 2. The compatibilist would say “you did otherwise in this counterfactual, therefore you have free will”. Under the correct definition in both scenario 1 and scenario 2 your choices were causally determined by factors outside of your control so in neither scenario did an act of free will occur.

Notably a definition of this sort can also lead you to the invalid position of 1a2b3c(free will exists, it is only compatible with indeterminism and our universe has only probabilistic indeterminism). This position is an exception to the general truth that answering 3c likely means one is using correct definitions. The idea is because of random quantum behavior you have the ability to do otherwise even if you start with the same initial conditions. But random quantum behavior is not in our control so it does not satisfy the correct definition of free will. This is a variation on the “ability to do otherwise” definition but it is still wrong. It is possible to qualify this definition to make it equivalent to the correct definition. For example, “the ability to do otherwise given the factors outside our control remain the same” or “the ability to do otherwise given the same conditions both initial and probabilistic”.

Some have attempted to salvage moral responsibility in a deterministic universe using what are called Frankfurt Cases(Frankfurt, 1969). These are another example of where the correct and incorrect definitions of free will do not overlap. Frankfurt cases occur in a thought experiment where Alice has some device that when Bob is going to make choice A it forces him to make choice B instead, but if he is going to choose B the device never activates. Bob had no ability to do anything other than B. The incorrect definition of free will would state that Bob could not do otherwise so in neither case did free will occur. Using the correct definition, when the device activates and Bob is forced to choose B, despite him wanting to choose A, his choice was causally determined by factors outside of his control; it was not an act of free will. When Bob chooses B without having to be forced then his decision was not causally determined by factors outside of his control; it was an act of free will.

Frankfurt’s original point was that he believed in the unforced case Bob would be morally responsible. Implicit in his paper is that the “ability to do otherwise” definition of free will should be revised such that it exists in the unforced case but not in the forced case. His instincts were correct because free will, correctly defined, does exist in the unforced case and does not exist in the forced case. He and others who agree with this line of thinking do not subscribe to the “ability to do otherwise” definition of free will because to have it in a deterministic universe requires the counterfactual conditions argument which is embarrassingly weak. Frankfurt Cases can be illuminating, but their analysis fails in the final step. They come much closer to correctly defining free will but in the end they fail to recognize that Frankfurt Cases are themselves only compatible with an indeterministic universe. In the original paper Frankfurt says:

The principle of alternate possibilities should thus be replaced, in my opinion, by the following principle: a person is not morally responsible for what he has done if he did it only because he could not have done otherwise. This principle does not appear to conflict with the view that moral responsibility is compatible with determinism.

The appearance of the principle has thoroughly deceived Frankfurt. It most certainly does conflict with the view that moral responsibility is compatible with determinism. Transforming his replacement principle into the positive version it becomes: people are morally responsible for what they do except when they did it only because they could not have done otherwise. Every action in a deterministic universe falls into this exception. There is only one underlying reason that anyone does anything: it was determined they would do it. They had no choice in the matter and in fact have never had any choice in any matter. In Frankfurt Cases one is not morally responsible if they choose to do A but were forced to do B, but there is simply no such thing as a “choice” in a deterministic universe.

Frankfurt Cases it turns out can only exist in an indeterministic universe. The belief that this thought experiment is somehow applicable to a deterministic universe is a mistake caused by an incorrect definition for a deterministic universe. The definition of a deterministic universe is one whose every future state at time t>0 can in principle be calculated by its initial state at time t=0. Frankfurt cases result in the same state of the universe at time t=x but there are two different paths to get there. At some time t<x the state of the universe is undetermined. A universe where there exists a time x such that at t=x the universe is determined but it is not determined for all t>0 might be called a fatalistic universe. A fatalistic universe is an indeterministic universe. A deterministic universe is a very exclusive definition. If there exists any time that the universe is indeterministic it means that the universe as a whole is indeterministic.

Let’s move from 3a(compatible with both) to 3d(compatible with neither). If you answered 3d you are what is called a hard incompatibilist. Hard incompatiblism constitutes another definitional error. It happens when people take “compatible with an indeterministic universe” to mean compatible with the indeterministic universe which we inhabit. That is not the correct definition of compatible which in this context actually means there exists a hypothetical universe of this type, not necessarily the universe we inhabit, that can accommodate free will. Because the definition of a deterministic universe is highly exclusive, the definition of its complement, an indeterministic universe, is highly inclusive. Really anything you can think of that contains a temporal element is compatible with an indeterministic universe. The only thing not compatible with indeterminism is determinism from beginning to end. Given their reason for choosing 3d is that they think free will is incompatible with our universe, you can infer the hard compatibilists answer to 2 likely to be c(the universe is indeterministic with only probabilistic indeterminism). The valid position closest to hard indeterminism is thus 1b2b3c, a type 4 universe where probabilistic indeterminism does exist but free will does not.

Finally, people might answer 3b(free will is compatible with determinism but not indeterminism). These people are also called compatibilists but answering 3b makes them distinct from compatibilists who answer 3a(compatible with both). Answering 3b is the most unforgivable mistake you can make in constructing a position of free will. Of course, the sorts of mental freedoms you can enjoy in a deterministic universe are a subset of those you can enjoy in an indeterministic universe. If you answer 3b it shows that you both do not understand what free will means considering you think it is compatible with determinism and you do not even understand what compatible means in this context. If it is compatible with determinism it is going to be compatible with indeterminism. If you answer 3b it shows that either you yourself are highly confused about this topic or it means you have a reckless disregard for causing confusion in others.

Part 2: The Three Big Arguments for the Existence of Free Will

The Scientific Argument

The scientific argument, or alternatively you could call it the evidentiary argument, is simple. There is simply more and better evidence for the existence of free will than for its non-existence. So much so, that denial of free will could be considered unscientific in a way far exceeding a belief in God. Denying free will clashes with many generally accepted principles of philosophy of science. It is one thing to be agnostic on the question, but the leap of faith required to actively deny free will is much longer than the leap to believe in God.

Free will originates as a mental phenomenon, thus it is subject to the mind-body problem. There are two solutions to the mind body problem. The first is monism, also known as panpsychism or physicalism. Monism posits that the mind and body are made of the same substance and that the mind is a product of the body and thus the two cannot be separated. Cartesian dualism, which is believed by most of the world’s religions, states that the mind is not a product of the body and can in principle exist without the body. The mind-body problem remains unsolved and will stay that way for the foreseeable future. It is wrong to have an expectation of physical proof or disproof of free will. Such proofs would have to simultaneously solve the mind body problem.

If physical evidence does not prove or disprove free will, the best it can hope to do is rule out certain monist theories of how free will might exist. It is completely unknown how the body produces the mind, or even if it does. Therefore, the best available evidence for existence or nonexistence of free will is obtained from within the mind: observation via introspection.

Thus, we have three tiers of evidence for the existence or non-existence of free will. The highest tier is physical proof. This tier is completely empty. The middle tier is evidence which comes from observing one’s own mind. The bottom tier is physical evidence which does not constitute a proof. The top tier might be empty but the middle tier is chock full of evidence. Using your senses to observe your own mind, every person finds that every conscious decision they have ever made is a product of free will. Even people who deny free will concede this point. They choose to deny free will relying on either bottom tier evidence or on an intuition that free will is illogical because it violates the principle of cause and effect. This last point is not even on the tier list but it is addressed by the Undeniable Mysteries argument for free will. The issue that deniers face is that their bottom tier evidence is simply outclassed by middle tier introspective evidence; it is like going with hearsay over closed circuit television footage.

Deniers admit that they observe having free will for every conscious decision. They still deny it because they believe free will is an illusion. Scientifically speaking, an illusion is any instance where our senses have fooled us into believing something untrue. Illusions, upon further investigation, can generally be dispelled. But no amount of investigation using the highest tier of available evidence can dispel the “illusion” of free will. Deniers believe the illusion is infinitely persistent; that we simply cannot trust our senses because they lie to us in every circumstance. This construct of an infinitely persistent illusion violates the general principles of philosophy of science. Science is mediated by our senses. To hold some fact of reality to this standard of evidence, that it may be the product of an infinitely persistent illusion, is simply not a scientific argument. That something is the subject of an infinitely persistent illusion is unfalsifiable.

The people who deny free will usually consider themselves to be rationalists. These people would consider a belief in free will to be irrational similar to a belief in God. But, it is the denial of free will which is irrational. It is more irrational to deny free will than to believe in God. A belief in God does not require an infinitely persistent illusion. God need not be constantly apparent and our not seeing him be the result of an illusion. Most people who believe in God do not think they have had an undoubtedly divine experience so they make the relatively small leap of faith to believe in the absence of any evidence contrary or corroborative. Everyone who disbelieves in free will has had the experience of free will every waking moment of their lives. They make the monumental leap of faith to disbelieve in free will despite the superabundance of contrary evidence.

Finally, even the bottom tier evidence is very often misinterpreted by those who deny free will. The evidence which supposedly disproves free will are some variation of the Libet Experiment(Libet et al., 1983). In this experiment, people are asked to move some part of their body while looking at a clock and they are asked when they had the conscious will to move based on the position of the clock hand. The ramp up in measured brain activity occurs before the reported will to move. It is said that because brain activity starts before the subject wills to move, it was out of their control and they only ascribed will to it retroactively. This retroactive misattribution is said to generalize for every action the subject takes. This conclusion ignores several alternative interpretations of the Libet Experiment which include the possibility of free will. Here are just four:

1. The most obvious interpretation is that we consider the decision before committing to it and it may be simply impossible to make a decision instantaneously without first having spent some time to consider it. If you subscribe to a monist solution to the mind-body problem(which most deniers do as part of their rationalism) and assume the existence of free will, activity before will is exactly what you would expect because instantaneous decisions would be impossible. The consideration of a decision must have some physical instantiation. It is hard to believe deniers miss an interpretation so obvious.

2. It could be an internal communication delay caused by limitations of our neurology. It may takes some time for the brain to react to having the will to move before the subject recalls the task and switches focus to committing the time to memory. Or it could be an illusory phenomenon similar to saccadic masking, which is when our brain removes the perception of time between eye movements. Our brain is known to play tricks with our temporal perception on these time scales(hundreds of ms) to maintain a steady conscious experience. Something about the human brain could cause us to systematically misreport the will to move as happening later than it really does.

3. It may be that free will does not initiate any action, but it can stop any action in process. This was the interpretation offered by Libet who later spoke against what he saw as wrong conclusions drawn from his experiment. In the original paper he said "The role of conscious free will would be, then, not to initiate a voluntary act, but rather to control whether the act takes place. It could do so by permitting the act to go forward or by vetoing it, so that no act occurs."

4. We have not solved the mind-body problem and free will could be retrocausal for all we know. Even if the Libet Experiment showed definitively that the conscious will to move occurred literally after the movement, that would not disprove free will; it can only rule out some theories as to how free will might work.

The Undeniable Mysteries Argument

The denial of free will typically comes from the rationalist attitude that free will is nonsensical. That it violates the law of cause and effect and it is too mysterious to be real. But there are two things which are just as mysterious, but unlike free will they are quite literally undeniable. Those two things are consciousness and the existence of the universe, be it an eternal universe or one with a beginning.

Consciousness is highly mysterious. This mystery is why there even is such a thing as the mind-body problem. It is hard to understand how a collection of matter could develop an internal conscious experience, especially an experience separate from the surrounding matter. Yet, no matter how mysterious it is, the existence of consciousness is undeniable. Deniers call free will an illusion, but they cannot do the same for consciousness. An illusion is a kind of experience. Consciousness is experience itself. So, one cannot have an illusion of being conscious without being conscious in the first place. The undeniable existence of this mysterious phenomenon requires us to open our minds to the possibility of free will. In the same manner that observing our own minds leads us to believe in consciousness, so too does it lead us to believe in free will.

The other undeniable mystery is the existence of the universe. The standard applied to free will – that it cannot exist because it violates cause and effect – would also state that the universe itself cannot exist. The existence of free will does require some form of exotic causality, but so does the existence of the universe. If the universe is eternal and has no beginning this would imply a kind of cyclic cosmology and the universe existing before the big bang. In this case, there was no “before” the universe and its existence is acausal. If, on the other hand, the universe had a beginning its existence is either acausal, retrocausal(meaning something within the universe retroactively caused it to exist) or it had a creator. A creator leads to the infinite regression problem and so becomes another example of acausality. Theologically God is often referred to as “the uncaused cause”, i.e. his existence is acausal. Many religions argue that God has free will and that he gifted the same ability to mankind. But, even if you do not believe in God it is undeniable that the existence of the universe implies the existence of exotic causality. Existence itself refutes the denier’s argument that things which violate the principle of cause and effect cannot exist.

The Integrated Psyche Argument

The integrated psyche argument asserts that consciousness and free will are a single integrated system and are inseparable – consciousness cannot exist without free will and vice versa. In denying free will, people postulate the existence of a sort of on-rails consciousness that might not seem too crazy but far more bizarre than they give it credit for.

The best analogy here is the mind as a car. If you affirm the existence of free will, you would say that you are sitting in the driver’s seat and the control of the car is analogous to your free will being in control of your body. One who denies free will argues that you are sitting in the passenger seat and you are only imagining that you are sitting in the driver's seat. What is rarely understood is that while you sit in the passenger seat you may not have control over the car, but you do have control over other aspects of your experience. You can choose to look out the window in any direction; this is analogous to choosing what to think about. You can choose to close your eyes; this is analogous to emptying your mind of any thoughts.

This choice of thought, like the movement of the body, is also the product of free will. It is the same exact feeling of free will whether you are choosing to think or choosing to act. In cartesian dualism this difference of thought need not have any physical instantiation. If you were a ghost in a void, without any body, you could still exercise free will in your choice of thoughts. Sitting in the passenger seat is not enough to eliminate free will. It is as if, you sitting in the passenger seat have another, recursive car in your head in which you are in the driver’s seat. In order to deny free will, you must not only be sitting in the passenger seat in the first car, but you must be sitting in the passenger seat in all the recursive cars ad infinitum. If you are sitting in the driver’s seat in any car, even a million layers down, you still have free will¹.

An on-rails consciousness is thoroughly along for the ride. It exists as an inactive experiencer. From a purely biological standpoint, as you become more practiced at something, those neurons become more myelinated and your brain becomes more efficient at performing that behavior. At the same time, performance of that behavior requires less conscious thought and it becomes more relegated to the subconscious. In a brain with an on-rails consciousness, the consciousness is totally inactive, serves no role, and exists only as an inefficiency. The integrated psyche argument is really that the free willed conscious activity of the mind and the experience of the mind are one in the same. If you are sitting in the car at all you must be in the driver’s seat one way or another.

Part 3: Why Right Wingers Need Free Will

Moral Responsibility

A philosophy of right wing conservatism requires free will because free will is a requirement for moral responsibility. Of course, Christianity is a big part of conservatism and in order for its main theme of forgiveness to have any meaning, people must be morally responsible for their actions in the first place. Having the inability to make choices and lacking all moral responsibility is a direct path to meaninglessness and nihilism. If your choices were determined by factors outside your control, those choices are for all intents and purposes random and have no meaningful content. In the case where we do not have free will, some people, in an attempt to recover meaning, offer a kind of hedonism. They’ll say: “Life does have meaning in the experiencing of joy and pleasure and the avoidance of pain and suffering”. But, without free will, whether you get to experience joy or are forced to endure pain is up to the random whims of the universe. Inevitably, no free will leads to nihilism as you cannot ascribe any meaning to such random whims of the universe.

Having control over our choices and having moral responsibility for them makes life meaningful. A main feature of conservatism is responsibility and that you can judge someone for their actions be those actions good or evil. Without free will there can be no room for judgmental concepts such as praise or condemnation.

It is not just that you can judge them but that you can justify it when people face positive or negative consequences commensurate with their actions. The correct justification for these consequences is simply that they deserve it. If there is no free will and all our choices were determined, you do not have the correct justification for why good deeds should be rewarded and why evil deeds should be punished. If you have no free will, it cannot be said that anyone deserves reward or punishment.

This question of being deserving of punishment leads into the question of criminal justice and what exactly happens conceptually to criminal justice when you deny free will. Of course, all of these concepts surrounding evil deeds have their complement that applies to good deeds. The most important purpose of criminal justice is punishment. Evil deeds deserve to be punished. This is called the retributive theory of criminal justice. Your sentence is retribution for what you did wrong. Free will deniers, without the retributive theory, are forced to resort to much weaker alternatives namely the quarantine theory of criminal justice and the deterrence theory of criminal justice.

The quarantine theory states that the purpose of criminal justice is to remove criminals from society so as to avoid further victimization. It is correct that quarantine is, along with the more important retribution, one of the purposes of criminal justice. But the issue with the quarantine theory is that it no longer works when you deny free will. However you frame it, being sentenced to prison is a negative experience and so is being a victim of a crime. If free will does not exist, you cannot justify prioritizing victims over criminals because both are equally undeserving of their negative experience. Without free will, the criminal is just morally innocent as the victim.

The other theory deniers can turn to is the deterrence theory of criminal justice. The idea is being a victim of crime is a negative experience. In order to engineer society such that there is the greatest ratio of positive experience to negative you must follow through on punishing criminals to deter criminal behavior. If we lived in an anarchy and criminals went unpunished, there would be far more pain and far less joy. There are two issues with this. The first is the previously discussed fact that you cannot actually ascribe meaning to pain and to joy if they are the whims of the universe. It can only be said that more joy and less pain is preferable if you have the power to act in that direction, but without free will you have no such power. You cannot even ask the question “Should we implement criminal justice for the sake of deterrence?”. Without free will, there is no “should”, you either do something or you do not and you have no control over it. Whether or not we do anything, including punishing crime, is the whim of the universe. The other issue is the same as before in that without free will the criminal is morally innocent. Under deterrence theory and without free will the criminal is made an example of and functions as a sacrificial lamb. If you simply accept free will you do not need to make this compromise of punishing the innocent for the sake of the greater good because the ones you are punishing are guilty.

A Tool to Combat Leftism

“Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered.”

-C.S. Lewis

Leftism is the politics of equality and redistribution. Choices made of free will are a primary source of human inequality. The fact that the agent that makes a choice is responsible for it, responsible for their own inequality, means that free will is a one of the primary rhetorical tools in the conservative’s toolbox. Leftism may be destructive in other ways, like when it goes against human nature, but it is undoubtedly destructive insofar as its beliefs about inequality and model about where it comes from is factually untrue. The conservative’s toolbox consists of a series of realist refutations to leftism which serve to explain or justify that human inequality which exists rightfully or whose existence has a positive effect as compared to the alternative.

Emotionally, leftism is motivated by envy of the “poor” and the guilt of the “rich”. Intellectually, it is powered by the declarations of the injustice of the status quo. Leftism is not inherently wrong or evil. For example, it is not inherently wrong that for the sake of fairness we should implement socialized medicine. The leftist impulse exists for a reason. Poverty is the natural state of man; it is the society with its social cooperation and division of labor that creates wealth. The haves cannot exist without the have-nots. This is true even if, like our economy, it is a positive-sum game. The have-nots often have the strength in numbers or the leverage to demand what they see as fair, thus leftism.

Imagine a tribe where the chief monopolizes access to women(access to women being a zero-sum game). He invites a beta uprising which is prototypical leftist politics. An example of obviously destructive leftist politics is the longshoreman’s union. Not all organized labor is necessarily destructive, but this organization certainly is. The longshoreman’s union mistakenly believes that they carry the entire economy on their backs and they are unequal in the sense that they are not being properly compensated for their Atlas-like jobs. The union believes, to everyone’s collective horror, it is their right to block any automation from being introduced to ports. The union is destructive by virtue of the false belief that they are unequal and their situation is unfair. They are wrong because they are replaceable; their skills could easily be learned by many who could perform the job just as well as they do. Many would be happy to become longshoremen because their compensation is more than fair relative to their skillset and the difficulty of the job. The threat of a strike certainly gives them a lot of leverage, but them having the leverage does not make it right for them to exercise it. It is one thing to hold your bosses and executives hostage to get a cut out of the bottom line, but to hold all of society hostage is antisocial behavior. Their activities are a negative-sum game and are destructive to society as a whole. Their false belief is not good faith but is highly motivated making this an example of malignant leftism.

The sources of human equality exist in a hierarchy of justifiability with ongoing mistreatment being the least justifiable. The inequality that comes from choices made of free will is the most justifiable. The civilizational cancer which we are duty-bound to destroy is not leftism in general but malignant leftism. Malignant leftism by default casts all inequality as coming from the ongoing mistreatment of the have-nots at the hands of the haves. Malignant leftism places the burden on its opposition to prove that inequality is justified. If you show that inequality is not the result of mistreatment, malignant leftism says it is the next least justified source. If you show it is not that either it goes to the next least justified and so on in an else-if algorithm. This closed minded algorithmic behavior is a fundamentally pseudointellectual exercise. Malignant leftism is overconfident and incurious. It is characterized as the pseudointellectual pursuit of equality. The task of right wing conservatism is to defeat malignant equality politics by using our rhetorical tools to exhaust their tedious lists.

There are three primary sources of human inequality which range from least to most justifiable:

1. The least justifiable is inequality as the result of mistreatment. Ongoing mistreatment is totally unjustifiable. Excepting ongoing mistreatment, the leftist may argue inequality via past mistreatment. Such inequality is slightly more justifiable as you can say it is wrong to forcefully take from those who were never perpetrators and give to those where were never victims.

2. In the middle is inequality from luck be it genetic or environmental(excluding the environment which is the result of mistreatment). This naturally occurring inequality can come from differences in natural endowments, differences in parents and upbringing, being in the right place at the right time, winning the lottery etc.

3. The most justifiable kind of inequality is that which comes from choices(with foreseeable consequences) that were made of free will. The most obvious example is the innocent free man versus the guilty prisoner. The condition of being free and the condition of being incarcerated are highly unequal but it is the difference in guilt that makes such inequality justifiable.

These varieties of inequality are what determine the tools in the conservative’s toolbox. Each tool is a method to transform the grievous inequality into a more justifiable inequality; simultaneously making forceful redistribution less justifiable. These tools are:

1. Free will. If you can prove that inequality is the result of a choice with known consequences made of free will, that is an instant game over for leftism.

2. Refuting the existence of present mistreatment with empirical evidence. This forces the leftist to vacate what is by far their strongest position.

3. Proving the effect of what present mistreatment does exist is smaller than what is being suggested.

4. Refuting the existence of past mistreatment with empirical and historical evidence.

5. Proving that the present effect of past mistreatment is insignificant or at least smaller than what is suggested.

6. Proving that the inequality is the result of environmental luck(as opposed to genetic luck). By proving that it is environmental luck you disprove the mistreatment theory.

7. Proving that it is genetic luck, i.e. differences in bodily and mental endowments. This is generally considered more justifiable than environmental luck.

The many forms of benign and malignant leftism are far from all being aligned but every form of malignant leftism follows this pattern of incorrect attribution of inequality to mistreatment. Communism is the idea that the rich capitalists are mistreating the working class via exploitation. Transgenderism is the idea that those who do not wish to be their physical sex are oppressed when people refuse to treat them as if they were the opposite sex. Third-Worldism is the idea that the rich countries became rich by stealing from the poor countries. Feminism is the idea that women are of lower status due to mistreatment by men.

The malignant leftism that offers us the greatest challenge has been called “wokeness”. Wokeness is an amalgamation of the different forms of malignant leftism based on group identity that maintain a large political influence. Each form is motivated by their respective envies and guilts. The strongest aspect of wokeness is the racial aspect, but there are also aspects of LBGT and feminism. The racial aspect has a greater focus on economics while LBGT and feminism are more social.

Feminist social politics, being less powerful than racial politics, are arguably much more destructive in one’s everyday life especially for young people. In recent memory, feminism used to have greater focus on the economic disparity between men and women. The defeat of feminist economics is an ideal learning opportunity. The arguments against feminist economics deriving from the conservative’s toolbelt became widespread. Women by nature are endowed with a different predisposition that prefers lower paying careers and prefers abandoning a career for raising their children. Additionally, women make choices in accordance with their predisposition of their own free will and are thus responsible for their own economic inequality.

The combination of hereditarianism(different genetic endowments) with free will is the conservative’s lethal argument. In the case of the argument against feminist economics, Part 1 is hereditarianism which uses empirical data to show a disparity in the male and female nature. The proof of a female nature destroys the feminist who – for the sake of attributing everything to mistreatment – implicitly assumes that woman is a blank slate without a nature and men brainwash women via “traditional gender roles”. Part 2 of the argument states that while the difference in predisposition explains the different pattern of choices, the predisposition is itself not causal because free will is involved. The ultimate cause of the inequality is the different choices women make. If you had hereditarianism without free will, the leftist case would be that the inequality should still be corrected despite stemming from natural differences instead of mistreatment. If you had free will without hereditarianism, malignant leftism – in order to attribute inequality to mistreatment – would imply that there was no disparate nature. They would imply that the subject was a blank slate and the statistical pattern of choices comes not from a predisposition but from a kind of brainwashing. Brainwashing of this type has been called things such as traditional gender roles, systemic racism, internalized misogyny, and internalized racism. Or if it is the supposed lingering brainwashing of past mistreatment it might be called generational trauma or generational poverty. But, if the inequality comes from a combination of free will and genetics, it is exceedingly difficult to justify corrective action.

The synergistic combination of free will(tool 1) and hereditarianism(tool 7) is the most powerful technique available to the right winger. But, because systematic right wing philosophy is poorly articulated and for theoretical reasons free will and hereditarianism are not properly unified this technique is always employed by accident. Free will and hereditarianism are both simultaneously true. The conventional hereditarian model of behavioral genetics, however useful, is wrong and does not allow free will. Part 4 provides a revised model of the human phenotype that unifies free will and behavioral genetics and lets the right winger use the ultimate technique with purpose.

Feminist economics has been defeated but leftist racial economics remains politically influential. The economic disparities between the races are highly conspicuous and the natural differences between the races are much less apparent than the natural differences between men and women. It should be no surprise that these disparities engender so much envy. Many have defined woke as “gay race communism”. Of course by race communism they mean a communism between the races. Between-race communism, along with any between group-level communism(e.g. Third-worldism, climate justice) is inherently undemocratic and unpopular with the group that is supposed to give up what they have. Between-group communism is the most at odds with human nature which desires self-determination and sovereignty on the group level. There is also colorblind communism where all the workers of the world are supposed to unite. The relatively most natural is within-group communism. Examples include the nonviolent parts of Nazism and fascism and what exists in effect in all homogeneous socialist countries. Those who call America backwards for not having European style socialism fail to realize that those same policies here would in effect become a between-race communism.

That some advocate for equality on the group level rather than on the individual level demonstrates how different forms of leftism can be at odds with one another. Group equality advocates give us insight into how free will works in malignant leftism. Malignant leftism has no defined position on free will. Free will selectively does and does not exist such that the status quo is maximally unjust. In wokeness, poor Whites chose to be poor of their own free will while poor Blacks did not. Rich Whites became wealthy by choosing to mistreat Blacks of their own free will. Rich Blacks either did not choose to mistreat but were simply lucky enough to avoid its effects or if they did mistreat they were tricked into a false consciousness of internalized racism. We should not invert the places where free will does and does not exist so as to make the status quo maximally just. Instead, we should be accurate and declare free will to exist in all conscious choices(provided they are not coerced) so that the theoretical justness of the status quo matches reality.

Several people have written about the origin of wokeness. The person who came the closest to the truth was Nathan Cofnas. In his January 2024 article “Why We Need to Talk about the Right’s Stupidity Problem” he introduced his theory: “Wokism is simply what follows from taking the equality thesis of race and sex differences seriously, given a background of Christian morality.”(Cofnas, 2024). The equality thesis is the assumption that men and women and all races and ethnic groups share the same exact average mental capacities, and perhaps even the same physical capacities. Wokeness is certainly about equality, but Cofnas is partially wrong in that wokeness is not fundamentally the tension between the equality in theory and the inequality in reality. No dispassionate analysis would lead one to believe in the equality thesis. The equality thesis is a motivated belief which follows from feelings of envy and guilt at the reality of inequality. When two groups of substantially differing average intelligence live together, with sufficient political consciousness, having some degree of “wokeness” becomes a necessary fact of history.

In our history, the degree of wokeness has been quite large. So much so that it has become the zeitgeist. The equality thesis is accepted by most people including conservatives. Cofnas is right that these conservatives do themselves a huge disservice; they are giving up tool 7 plus their ultimate technique. Cofnas says conservatives “fail to recognize the implications of their own beliefs”. This is somewhat unfair. The equality thesis is not the conservatives’ only belief. They also believe in free will and they believe that mistreatment is not a significant factor in inequality. The implication of all these beliefs put together is the Sowellian cultural explanation. As Cofnas puts it:

[It is] a culture that for some reason follows (population-representative) people of certain ancestries wherever they go all over the world, and is impervious to the most extreme interventions, including cross-racial adoption, and which tracks biological markers such as brain size.

This is obviously not a parsimonious explanation but neither is the leftist’s explanation which attributes the inequality to the powerful yet highly elusive systemic racism. This is just as lacking in parsimony. No matter what, the implications of the equality thesis strain credulity, which is not surprising because the equality thesis is factually wrong.

Cofnas concludes: “The priority for right-wing intellectuals should be disseminating accurate information about race and sex differences, and devising a new political philosophy that is intellectually and morally appealing to the current left-wing elites.” Correct on both counts. However, this political philosophy cannot be pure materialist hereditarianism, which is profoundly unpopular. It appeals to neither the leftist nor right wing ethos. The idea that criminal behavior is a product of environment plus genetics, with genetics being of greater importance, does not appeal to leftists. They do not want to write anyone off, especially not whole groups, as evil by nature. If you have seen any of the discourse on the bugs in Starship Troopers, the demons in Frieren, the orcs in the Lord of the Rings you would know that leftists even object to fictional creatures being evil by nature. Leftists will fight tooth and nail to increase the importance of the environment. Neither does materialist hereditarianism appeal to right wingers. They may be more tolerant of fictional evil but they do not want to write real people off because they believe real people have free will. If you want to defeat wokism, you have to understand that it will be very hard convincing leftists that genetics is the main determinant of human behavior. Even if you do, there is no guarantee that just because the inequality of cognitive stratification is natural that they will consider it fair and stop desiring to correct it. Luckily there is an alternative to materialist hereditarianism: the synthesis of hereditarianism with free will.

Part 4: Unifying Free Will and Hereditarianism

A belief in free will is the logical antecedent for moral responsibility and is necessary for a complete right wing conservative philosophy. And, if you plan on combating the ideas of leftism, it is also necessary to argue using empirical hereditarian scientific findings. As stated in Part 3, the most powerful technique available to a conservative in battling the equality politics of leftism is the combination of free will plus hereditarianism. It was this combination that recently more or less defeated feminist economics. However, the conventional model of heredity happens to be incompatible with free will. If you take it as a real description of reality rather than just a model you exclude the possibility of free will.

Hereditarianism is the position that a large amount of the variation in human phenotype can be explained by genetics. “The variation in the human phenotype” is synonymous with inequality and encompasses such things as socioeconomic status, morphology, athletic performance, academic performance and IQ. Hereditarianism(a.k.a. Human biodiversity) as a conservative explanation for disparities has been simmering in the background for a long time with figures like Charles Murray and Arthur Jensen. As a reaction to wokeness and the Black Lives Matter movement, hereditarianism has experienced a resurgence in interest and is at the bleeding edge of right wing politics.

Human phenotypic variation can be split into two types: physical and mental. Of the greatest interest to conservatives is the mental variation. Physical variation is a much lower stakes discussion. Physical variation is simultaneously much more conspicuous and in a mechanized society is a much smaller factor in socioeconomic inequality. If someone answers the question “What causes male athletes to outcompete female athletes?” with “It is all because women are mistreated in society”, that person will find it very hard to be taken seriously. Mental variation is hidden behind a veil. Anyone else’s mind but your own is unobservable so to measure the heritability of the mind is done indirectly with behavioral genetics. It is much easier to over attribute mental variation to societal mistreatment or otherwise environmental causes than physical variation.

Among the different mental variations the one by far the most well understood and most relevant is IQ or intelligence quotient. IQ is a measure of the general factor of intelligence which was discovered by Charles Spearman. Emphasis on discovered and not invented because the general factor of intelligence is not a subjective projection onto the data. Spearman’s factor analysis(a branch of math he invented, or if you prefer discovered) of intelligence tests revealed single dominant general factor. This was simply the nature of the underlying data. Had human intelligence instead consisted of several roughly equal orthogonal factors, that is what factor analysis would show but it does not.

As much as many would not like it to be so, the fact is that the races/ethnicities of the world vary widely in average IQ, even controlling for the environment. The different races are quite different in appearance and as many hereditarians like to say “evolution did not stop at the neck”. The position that the different races vary widely in the genetic component of intelligence explains a vast number of observations such as the variations in socioeconomic status across countries, academic performance, national development, and many people’s normal everyday experience. In recent history, many Asian countries have experienced rapid economic development. Many of those started from a very weak position having been ravaged by communism and/or war. This development was much more rapid than anything that has happened in the West because they had exposure to our more advanced technology and could leapfrog many of the steps we had to go through. Sub Saharan African countries enjoy the same exposure to the more advanced Western technology, but in the same period many Sub Saharan African countries have stagnated and remain undeveloped. If we accept the genetic difference in IQ this is very easy to explain. These African countries lack a high national IQ which is one of the ingredients needed for rapid development.

The aforementioned conventional model of heredity is(Sesardić, 2005):

\(V_p = V_g + V_e\)

The variance in the phenotype, Vp, is equal to the variance explained by genetics, Vg, plus the variance explained by environment Ve. The heritability, or heritability estimate, of a particular trait is given by Vg/Vp (or just Vg is Vp is scaled to equal 1). A common way to get a heritability estimate is to use twin studies which look at how much more similar identical twins are than fraternal twins(identical twins sharing all their genetics and fraternal twins sharing on average half of their genetics).

There have been many objections to this model from “environmentalists” who believe that a trait, usually IQ, is less genetic than this model would have you believe. The first kind of objection is that the heritability estimate is wrong because there need to be additional terms that do not fit in either genetics or environment. These terms are the statistical interaction between genetics and environment(nonlinearity) and the covariance between genetics and environment(e.g. the environment created by your parents who are genetically similar to you). This objection is fair enough but the effect of these terms can be estimated for IQ using adoption studies. Among the relevant traits and populations they are sufficiently small that it does not change any of the facts of the matter for conservative hereditarian argument.

The second type of objection is that the heritability estimate is not even wrong and it does not mean what its advocates think it does. This objection stems from a fundamental limitation with heritability estimates which is that you can only collect data on real people, not hypothetical people. You are limited to the extant combinations of genetics and environment. For example, suppose you started out with very unequal environments which you then made more equal. Because a smaller percent of the variance will be explained by environment, the heritability of the trait will increase. In other words, the heritability of a trait is not a constant but is dependent upon the sample being used. It is then said to gain any insight into the global causes of genotype and environment on phenotype you would need what is called a reaction norm where you place the same genotype in every possible environment with the measured trait being the dependent variable.

These objectors are correct in that the heritability of a trait is not a constant, but their mental model of hereditarians is wrong because we are well aware of these limitations. They are also wrong in their belief that the conventional model provides no informational content. You can gain insight, albeit imperfect, into how genetic a trait is without needing to meet their impossible standard of evidence. If identical twins(reared together) are much more similar on a trait than are fraternal twins(reared together), you can say with confidence that that trait has a genetic component. Another way to glean information from heritability estimates is to compare them relative to the heritability of other traits, especially those you have a better intuition for such as height.

From this second objection it is also argued that a high heritability estimate does not imply a genetic basis for group differences, i.e. a within-group heritability does not imply between-group heritability. They are right that between group heritability is not implied. It could be the case that one group with similar genotypes was mistreated by society at large because of their genotype and this depressed their IQ. This would be an example of reactive covariance between genetics and environment in that your environment is shaped by people’s reaction to your genotype. Or it could be that you have passive gene environment covariance and your group has an on average worse environment for reasons other than mistreatment, or that you chose it(chosen environment is what defines active covariance). If these covariances are mistakenly included in variation due to genetics it could give a high heritability where none exists. If these covariances are not controlled for it could cause one group to score higher than another even if they have the same mean genetic potential. But the problem for environmentalists is that we have corroborating evidence such as the results from interracial adoption studies from which, when combined with a high heritability estimate, a genetic difference between groups can be inferred.

Both of these species of objections fall flat. I also object to the model Vp = Vg + Ve but for an entirely different reason. I do not object because it lacks utility, it is quite useful indeed. I object because this model is not compatible with free will and thus cannot be the fundamental description of reality. Hereditarians are often accused of being “genetic determinists”. Of course this is wrong, hereditarians do not believe that the variation due to the environment is zero. You would have to be crazy to think that. However, both hereditarians and environmentalists are often guilty of what might be called genetic plus environmental determinism. It is not merely that genetic determinism is wrong, genetic plus environmental determinism is also wrong because determinism is wrong; free will exists.

Variance in phenotype includes both behavioral and non behavioral phenotype. The proximate cause of conscious human behavior are choices made of free will, choices which are not causally determined by factors outside the choice-making agent’s control. Behavioral phenotype is neither the result of nature nor nurture. Non behavioral phenotype is not literally the choices themselves. But, choices made of free will are certainly one of the factors contributing to the non behavioral phenotype. Among the fiercest opponents to conventional models, their gold standard for determining how heritable a trait is would be hypothetical reaction norms which graph the trait of a certain genotype in every environment. But such graphs are not only a practical impossibility, if free will exists reaction norms of human behavior are a very literal impossibility. They assume the mind is an input output machine where the outputs are causally determined by the inputs. The same environment, the same genetics, the same exact initial conditions can yield any number of different behavioral phenotypes.

So if free will exists, why can human behavior be statistically modeled at all? My solution to this problem unifies free will and hereditarianism and it is called Predisposition Function Collapse Theory or PFC theory. It is heavily inspired by Penrose and Hammeroff’s Orch OR theory(Hameroff & Penrose, 1996). Inspired by ideas like Godel's incompleteness theorem and the Chinese room thought experiment, Penrose had this idea that consciousness is not a computable process; consciousness cannot be achieved by a Turing machine. Most things in physics are computable, but as far as anyone knows the collapse of the quantum wave function might not be. Penrose suggested Objective Reduction(OR), his version of the objective collapse of the wavefunction which uses gravity, as the mechanism which creates consciousness. Hameroff suggested a structure in brain cells known as microtubules where such quantum collapse might be orchestrated, thus Orch OR: Orchestrated Objective Reduction.

Predisposition Function Collapse Theory posits the existence of a predisposition function where the independent variable is all the different choices you can make and the dependent variable is how much you are predisposed to making them. The act of making a choice “collapses” the predisposition function as the other possibilities are eliminated. How predisposed you are to making a choice does not represent your probability for making that choice, instead it represents how “easy” it is to make that choice. Choices that you are less predisposed to make require something like a greater expenditure of will. The choice that you are most predisposed to make can be said to require no such expenditure. Orch OR is based on a monist perspective in the mind-body problem(Penrose calls himself a physicalist). PFC theory is agnostic as to the solution to the mind-body problem.

The parameters to the predisposition function include your genetics, your unchosen environment and all the conscious choices you have made in your life up to that point(i.e. your chosen environment). The existence of the predisposition function is what allows human behavior to be modeled statistically. Of their own free will, people do things they are more predisposed to do more often than they do things that they are not predisposed to do. Not because they have to but because they choose to. Going against your predisposition does require some kind of expenditure and animals generally want to conserve their mental energies by following the path of least resistance.

Armed with the Predisposition function, we can replace the flawed model of phenotype: Vp = Vg + Ve with one that actually represents reality. Because behavioral phenotype is a direct result of free will, but non behavioral phenotype is not these two must be separated². The complete model of phenotype is

Non Behavioral Phenotype:

\(P_n(t) = N(G, E_u(t), |P_b(0 < t' < t)\rangle) \)

Behavioral Phenotype:

\(P_b(t) \xleftarrow{\text{Collapses via free will}} \Psi(G, E_u(t), |P_b(0 < t' < t)\rangle)\)

The Non Behavioral Phenotype is P_n(t) = N(G,E_u(t),| P_b(0<t’<t) >) where P_n(t) is the Non Behavioral Phenotype at time t where t is the time since the subject first became conscious. N is the Non Behavioral Phenotype Determination Function, G is the genetics, E_u(t) is the unchosen environment at time t, and | P_b(0<t’<t) > is a state vector representing all choices made up to that point and it means the same thing as the chosen environment. As you can see, the behavioral phenotype is an input in the non behavioral phenotype in the form of what is called the chosen environment.

The Behavioral Phenotype is P_b(t) <-Collapses via free will- Psi(G, E_u(t), | P_b(0<t’<t) >) where P_b(t) is the behavioral phenotype at time t, Psi is the predisposition function, G is the genetics, E_u(t) is the unchosen environment, and | P_b(0<t’<t) > is a state vector representing all choices made up to that point. In addition to being an input in the Non Behavioral Phenotype the behavioral phenotype before time t is also an input in the behavioral phenotype. This creates a feedback loop as the predisposition function influences your choices so do your choices influence the predisposition function. The operator with the arrow that says collapses via free will is to emphasize that this is a kind of agentic collapse rather than a probabilistic collapse.

The presence of genetics and environment in both of these equations is what allows phenotype to be modeled statistically. This model of phenotype unifies free will and hereditarianism. It thus can serve as a philosophical foundation for the most effective right wing argument.

Conclusion

Free will is a very underrated part of right wing philosophy and it is very underrated as a tool for combating leftists. The topic is not done justice. People see free will discourse as a kind of quagmire that cannot be made sense of let alone converted into effective arguments. People quickly assume that free will is unscientific and discard this essential tool. Hereditarians have an intuition, in many ways correct, that free will is not compatible with their arguments. But with my synthesis, it is made compatible. It is my hope that this essay has rehabilitated free will and that you might use free will to make the best possible right wing arguments.

Citations

Cofnas, N. (2024). Why We Need to Talk about the Right’s Stupidity Problem. Substack. https://ncofnas.com/p/why-we-need-to-talk-about-the-rights

Frankfurt, H. G. (1969). Alternate possibilities and moral responsibility. The Journal of Philosophy, 66(23), 829. https://doi.org/10.2307/2023833

Hameroff, S., & Penrose, R. (1996). Orchestrated reduction of quantum coherence in brain microtubules: A model for consciousness. Mathematics and Computers in Simulation, 40(3–4), 453–480. https://doi.org/10.1016/0378-4754(96)80476-9

Libet, B., Gleason, C. A., Wright, E. W., & Pearl, D. K. (1983). Time of Conscious intention to act in relation to onset of cerebral activity (readiness-potential). Brain, 106(3), 623–642. https://doi.org/10.1093/brain/106.3.623

Sesardić, N. (2005). Making sense of heritability. Cambridge Univ. Press.

1. People often say consciousness and free will cannot be related to quantum mechanics because the brain is too warm, wet and noisy. They miss this point that free will can be many many layers down and can be an arbitrarily small physical effect.

2. The most important heritable trait for conservatives is IQ. The study of the heritability of IQ is often considered behavioral genetics. In my model of phenotype I split behavioral and non behavioral genetics and for the sake of clarity I should explain where IQ falls in this model. IQ along with other psychometrics belongs more in the latter as a non behavioral trait. IQ is a measurement of the brain which can only be mediated by test taking which is a kind of behavior. Test taking being a behavior is subject to the phenomenon of choice and people can choose to try as much or as little as they like and can choose to do as arbitrarily poorly on the test as they like. Put people for the most part try as hard as they can on IQ tests so it makes more sense to consider it a non behavioral trait.