On Free Will

    Agency is a core teaching found in the scriptures. From the Garden of Eden to the Final Judgment, the plan of salvation hinges on our agency. It is so important that we waged a war, staking our spiritual lives to fight for it, not even knowing whether we would come out safe in the end of our mortal lives. That is how important it is.

    But how does agency work? How is it that we become “agents unto ourselves”? Obviously our being moral agents, is dependent upon having some sort of free will, wherein we can choose for ourselves that which we want.

    Therefore, to understand free will better we have to look at how the world views it, and what problems there are with the existence of agency. In general, there are four schools of thought concerning free will and the workings of the universe.

    Firstly incompatibilists state that because the universe is deterministic, there is no free will. Libritarianists on the other hand state that because free will exists, the universe is not deterministic. Both argue that a deterministic universe is incompatible with the existence of free will. The third school of thought, Hard Indeterminism refutes libritarianism, stating that free will does not exist even in a non-deterministic universe. Finally, Compatibilists state that free will and determinism can co-exist.

    We will cover these four different view points each in turn, but first let us take a look at free will and what it requires to exist. First let us imagine floating in space, with no body, nowhere to go, and nothing to do. Without a circumstance to exercise our will, it becomes meaningless. We can only make a choice if there is something to choose. Therefore our ability to exercise our will is by necessity dictated by our circumstances.

    Secondly we need to be given at least two possibilities from which to choose. Being given a single option does not allow us to exercise agency, for we have no choice but the single option presented before us. We need to be given multiple possibilities, and while they don't need to be equally probable, they must be possible. See 2nd Nephi Chapter 2.

    Thirdly we need consequences of those choices. The only value there is to choice is if there are different consequences to them. If every decision led to the exact same outcome, then any actions taken were all in vain. Any decision made would be fake, every choice a lie. There is no meaning to agency, no value to our desires.

    For example, if all were guaranteed to eventually return to God regardless of the choices made in life, then the fact that I sacrificed so much and finally made it to the Celestial Kingdom becomes worthless as everyone gets there anyways, even the filthy whore-mongers that rape and pillage and seek for the glory of the world.

    Consequences makes the choices we make from a mere mental exercise into something real. Without that difference, free will is an illusion, where we are not captains of our own destiny, but rather pawns of fate.

Choices without different consequences are meaningless,

    While these are the requirements for agency, this still doesn't clear up the problem of free will mentioned above. For us to better understand problem of free will, let us take a look at a simple example: Imagine a ball resting on a hill. Whether the ball rolls left or right, can it be said that the ball chose to roll either way? No, it acted not of its own volition, but rather as a consequence of physical forces acting upon it. This is crux of the the determinism and free will conundrum.

    Incompatibilism states that we are no different than the ball, with any “choice” we make simply a natural consequence of the physical forces acting within the context of our bodies and minds. Just as the ball rolled in one direction, so too do we act not out of a choice, but because of the natural forces acting upon us.

    Now let us add bouncy muscles to the ball, and a computer chip to control its direction. Even in this case, the ball isn't making a choice when it picks a side to roll down. It is the programmer who programmed the ball to roll in that direction that ultimately made the choice.

    In this sense, if we are created by god, then God is responsible for our actions. He predetermined our choices through his programming. This is the second layer of the free will problem.

    Libritarianists try to get around this by stating that the universe is not deterministic, thus allowing for choice. The indeterminate nature of the universe means that it could go either way. However, this is no solution, as instead of solving the problem it compounds it.

    Again, in an indeterminate universe, let us take the programmable bouncy ball, and add a choice making device, which makes its choices dependent upon a special indeterminate particle in this universe (something akin to the quantum mechanical effects that happen in our universe). Sometimes the particle will point left, and others right. In this case can the ball be said to be making a choice?

    Of course it doesn't make a choice. The so called choice is dependent upon chance, and not upon the “desires” of the ball in question. In that event, our choices are ultimately due to both the programmer and to chance. This isn't any closer to a ball making the choice than in the deterministic case. In fact, the problem has been further compounded by probability.

     So it is in any case where the human soul has been created by God. Whether determinate or indeterminate, any soul so created is ultimately no different than a puppet of the creator or a puppet of chance. It is simply a matter of the complexity of the program, and has nothing to do with resolving the issue of free will.

    Then how do we resolve this? Simple. As Joseph Smith wrote “[The] mind of man [is] coequal with God himself.” This simple sentence is able to resolve what philosophers throughout the past thousands of years haven't been able to understand, let alone figure out.

    While it is true that God is our Creator and our Father, in the sense that he clothed our eternal wills with spirit bodies, organizing our spirit bodies, and breathing into it our will, and has even raised, nurtured, and loved us from the beginning, that does not mean he created the core of ourselves, namely our will. That part is eternal, as Joseph Smith stated many times in many diverse ways.

Without aseity the question becomes:
are we puppets to chance or fate.

    This means that at its core, our will is absolutely independent of circumstance, a will that is, to some degree on par with God's himself. What we will or desire is not dictated by anything other than ourselves. Our will is self-caused, not inflicted upon us by circumstance, luck, fate, or what-have-you.

    However, just because we have a free will to choose, doesn't mean that we have total freedom to go where we wish, for we are still bound to our circumstances as well as the consequences of our choices and the choices of others. Our families, our communities, our societies, and even our bodies, minds, and emotions all have their own programming that affects us and channels us down different paths.

    However it does mean that at our core we are free and independent and that our desires are not caused, but rather we are the cause of our own desires. So it is that while we may be slaves of our circumstances, we can fight and rebel against the yoke of bondage, for it is He that sets us free.

    We have the freedom to fight against the will of our bodies, to try to cast off the shackles of addiction and to fight against the carnal lusts of the flesh. We have the freedom to fight against the will of our emotions, to try to heal the deep scars on our souls that we have hidden inside and to face and overcome the anxieties and fears that beset us. We have the freedom to fight against the will of our minds, to reject the doubts and falsehoods that so easily beset us and to take the leap of faith necessary to open ourselves to new and glorious truths.

    We have the freedom to fight against the will of our families, to deny the incorrect traditions of our fathers and to try and stop the cycle of abuse from the past. We have the freedom to fight the will of our society, to carve our own way forward and fight against unrighteous dominion wherever it lies. We have the freedom to fight the will of the world, to destroy the whore of Babylon and bring forth Zion. 

    The freedom to try doesn't guarantee success, but the fact that the option exists is proof of a will that supersedes any programming that has been imposed upon us from external sources.

     What a revelation this is! Up until now it was not known that man was self-existent. It was believed that man was caused, or created, and as such, God the creator of man would be responsible for man's choices. This was the central problem between free will and determinism.

    Without free will, how can man be accountable for his actions? Without a determinate universe, how could God be all knowing and all powerful? However with this new and glorious revelation, it becomes clear that man is responsible for his own actions, and that God is an all knowing and all powerful dependable being.

    Not only is our folly our own, but so is our righteousness. When we choose to follow god, it is our own choice, and not a preprogrammed directive. That is the weight of the worth of agency.

    Without agency, our choices are just as valueless as the ball's, we being mindless slaves, no different than the elements from which we are made, live meaningless lives without purpose or worth. With agency, every action we take part in is a reflection of what we want, and has the meaning and weight of our soul behind it.

    God's purpose is to elevate us, from our mundane meaningless existence, to a meaningful one. This is exactly why he so strongly respects our agency, even when it results in harm to ourselves and others. This is also why we fought so hard to protect our agency. We wanted to prove to ourselves what we willed, not to have the wills of others pushed upon us

Whether we seek out the light, or hunger after the dark it is
our choice, and it is that resolution that defines who we are.

    This is why, to fully exercise our will or agency, we need to ask, seek, and knock. The Greek for ask, seek, and knock found in the new testament is in the present imperative tense. This means that we need to be to “be continually seeking, asking and knocking”. By doing so we fully exercise our agency, and prove what it is that is our true desire.

    This supreme gift of agency, where the divine spark within our will has been clothed in flesh, and given a circumstance wherein we are able to choose whatever we wish without interference from eternal laws, is the greatest endowment which god has granted upon us. Our maturing to the point where we can finally yield our will unto him, is the only way that we can finally become like him. This why our agency is so vital. Without it we cannot choose good, and as a consequence we cannot be good.

    I testify, that this revelation that Joseph Smith received, is the only way to truly reconcile an understanding of God, Man, Agency, and the universe. He was a prophet of God, and this revelation is vital to our understanding ourselves, and to our eternal salvation and progression.