Posted: Sep 20, 2017 11:02 am
GrahamH wrote:How about speaking, is that a free will act, in your opinion? It seems to me that we do not deliberate, do not think rationally about our speech before we voice it. Isn't it also one of the stronger candidates for an experience of free will?
Thinking about my experience of speaking I would say there is a strong sense of agency and intentionality to it. It seems that these are my words that I intended to say, but I can't separate the saying from the intention. I can't give myself a good account of how the words are chosen. They just flow. It doesn't seem possibly that I could tell the difference if any external influence that I was not aware of was subtly seeding the words. It seems quite possible I would still think they were my freely willed words unless I could see very clear evidence they were not.
An example of that could be inadvertent pagarism.
I don't see a need for emotion there and I don't see that strong emotion would make my words less mine or less intentional or less free-willed.
Speaking per se is surely a free will act, but the words we speak as adults are so thorougly learned that they are habitual, not requiring significant forethought - they just flow, as you say. Thus, some emotion (not usually strong) drives us to speak in the first place, but there is usually no emotion involved in choosing the words, IMO.