❤️Something about Philosophy - Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will

The fourth Thursday of the month is our time to get together for camaraderie, a fun meal, and of course a discussion, regarding something about Philosophy.

The meeting on September 25th will be facilitated by Mark and will discuss Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2023) by Kevin J. Mitchell.

Based on neuroscience, Mitchell explains how evolution gave agency to living organisms, from the most primitive life forms capable of motion to the emergence of neural networks capable of decoupling perception from action and internally representing information about the environment, which enables higher animals to model and predict the external world and to act on the basis of reasons.

Further, the physical indeterminacy of the future and a certain randomness in neural activity enables these animals to generate novel solutions to problems and to make choices on the basis of meaning. Human beings eventually evolved the neural ability to model their own cognitive processes, which gave them consciousness and the ability to generate abstract ideas. Finally, the rational and conscious control of their actions by human beings can be understood as their having free will.

Mark also created 23-page analytical summary with excerpts from the book. When you send Mark your email address he will send you a copy of the summary.

Use this link (the Meetup Chat) to send Mark your email address please.