A world without free will

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Lately I’ve been completely enamored with the idea of life without free will. I’m not writing this to convince you one way or the other, but rather address a question that inevitably comes up when talking about free will.

“Even if we don’t have free will, why does it matter - How would I live my life differently?”

At first glance you might think not much can change, but in my experience, living under this pretense has actually had a profound effect on the way I think, make decisions & experience day-to-day life.

The first, and probably most important change has been the way I feel about others. When free will is thrown out the door, feeling anger and/or blame towards someone suddenly becomes not only stupid, but completely pointless. If we are the way we are because of the the cards we were dealt; compassion is often the first response.

The other major change has been in the way I think of myself. I’ll be the first to admit that my abundance of self confidence often can come off arrogant. When I’m no longer able to take credit for my own circumstances; egotistical thoughts transform into a overwhelming sense of gratitude & humility.

I think the most interesting & paradoxical part of this journey for me, has been that adopting this ultra-rational mindset has actually reinforced a lot of spiritual concepts. If you take god out of the serenity prayer; you suddenly have a Christian prayer that fits in a rational world completely absent of free will.

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

At first the idea of a life without free will sounded depressing, scary and just plain crazy. Oh, how I couldn’t of been more wrong.

Want to go further down the free will rabbit hole? Watch this… Sam Harris Free Will Talk

A wasted vote

Einstein said the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. I feel like I’m surrounded by political insanity. You’ll have a hard time finding a sensible American who believes that our two-party political system is working, but if you ask them to vote for a third-party candidate they actually agree with, suddenly you have taken a turn for crazy town.

Can I please remind everyone that as of right now, we still live in a democracy? Guess what happens if people stop voting for these corrupt, pandering figureheads – they won’t get elected! Yet, time and time again I hear people complain about the status quo, and then watch them rationalize until they vote for it.

It’s okay though, I understand. People are terrible at making smart, long-term decisions. Hence the 45.3 million U.S. smokers - 69 percent of whom wish they could quite. Smoking “just one” cigarette feels relatively harmless in the short-term, and so does voting for the lesser of two evils. Unfortunately, a lifetime of these relatively harmless decisions leads to cancer. The tough, long-term decision that has to be made is to stop smoking completely. Until we make that decision, we are killing ourselves one, relatively harmless, decision at a time.

It’s time to stop inhaling the toxic chemicals of the two-party system. It’s time to make the tough decision for our future. That means voting for politicians you believe in. The first people to push change are always the crazy ones, but in the words of Steve Jobs, the ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. Let’s set an example.

Influences: Gary Johnson Interview, iSideWith.com, Third Party Presidential Debate, Freakonomics Podcast - We the Sheeple, Common Sense Podcast - No Truth, No Consequences, Planet Money Podcast - The No-Brainer Economic Platform, Dr. David Eagleman on the brain

Sources: http://www.cdc.gov/