Free the Fruit Flies?
Interesting story up on Yahoo from Reuters, suggesting that fruit flies may be making “decisions” independently of outside stimuli. The scientists who conducted the study argue that this might be an argument for something along the lines of free will. I will wait for the scientists and neurophilosophers to chime in on the comments, but I’m not sure I fully see the argument. It seems to me that the neurological argument for determinism always took the internal construction of the nervous system into account, and at the very least the Reuters article doesn’t pick up on that. If the different fruit flies had different internal configurations to start with, that would seem to explain the different results. At the very least it strikes me as a potential explanation. And if there is some kind of “purpose” being found in the decision making process of these fruit flies that’s not purely a neurological process, what kind of process is it? And is that process determinist?
About Dave Thomer
Born and raised in Philadelphia. Studied philosophy at Fordham University in the Bronx, where I made many great friends and met my wonderful wife. We moved back to Philadelphia, where I studied philosophy some more and became a teacher. Online and off, I'm looking for ways that we can be better citizens and build stronger communities.