Free Will Examples

Humans only have free will when they are aware of the fact that they are making logical decisions and judgments.
In order to have free will, humans must make logical decisions. Logical decisions are reaching a conclusion after careful consideration of multiple options. Examples of logical decisions are thought suppression and mental control. Though both of these have been proven to increase the thought of a certain subject in the long term, there is a slight moment after the thought of suppression in which this action might take place (Wegner, 1987). When we do not take part in rational decisions, we inherently prioritize things by feelings and gut reactions (Damasio, 1996; Schwarz & Clore, 1996). This means that actions and knowledge acquisition are determined by “shortcut processes” where the individual does not have free will, and instead only feelings supplemented with unconscious behavioral …show more content…
Furthering this idea, a seemingly logical decision, such as trying not to overshoot a golf ball, has underlying emotions in connection to the unconscious which causes golf ball to be overshot (Wegner, Ansfield, & Pilloff, 1998). A reasoning such as this explains why when people try to get in a good mood or relax actually have the opposite effect because they do not exhibit free will over their feelings (Wegner, Erber, & Zanakos, 1993; Wegner, Broome, & Pilloff, 1998). Wegner’s experiment on vicarious agency further explores these feelings in which he asked participants if they felt as if they were controlling another person’s arms (Wegner, 2004). This means even if the participants “felt” as if they were controlling the arms (no free will), it was not tested if they actually knew they were not moving