In this entry, I want to bring up a very interesting aspect of the "free will debate" that I don't hear talked about much, if at all, and that is: "creativity." I believe that human beings are capable of creative acts that are in the category of "willed events" and are "uncaused" [see discussion here]. Thus, creativity is truly a "new creation" in the universe. It is "something from nothing." I know if may seem crazy to think of human creativity that way, but I hope to show why I say that and how such a thing can be reasonable, even if you don't accept the idea yourself.
First, by
creativity I mean things like new ideas, inventions, works of art, music, new
written works, even philosophy sometimes.
Maybe even this blog entry! I am
not thinking of any special definitions when I talk about creativity. I think most people would define creativity
this way. I personally would limit
creative acts to humans and to God, in the same way I think willed events are
only something humans and God have access to [see here]. Also, as with the concept of free will, I
think true creativity is a rare thing for each person. I think we can train ourselves to become more
creative, but I think that true, "never before seen", ideas are
generally rare events in our lives.
Given that, I think a lot of things we consider "creative" ideas
are actually ideas that just follow from previous ideas - they are "caused
events." I think uncaused events
are rare, and so I think creative uncaused events are rare. Exactly where the line is between a new
uncaused creative act and a caused creative act is not obvious to me. Even uncaused events can have a significant
component of "influence" from previous events. But a true creative act has some component in
it that is uncaused and totally new and comes "out of the blue." We use terms like that: "out of the blue", "it just
came to me", "an 'aha' moment", "a light bulb went
off", "I just had an inspiration", etc. I think these refer to the creative uncaused
cause. Again: not always.
But at least some of time.
Human
beings are creative. They come up with
new ideas, new concepts, new ways of thinking, etc. In my job as a researcher, I feel that
creativity is crucial. We move forward
as a society by coming up with creative solutions to the problems that we
face. But creativity is everywhere – in
art, in music, in literature, in medicine, in technology – and its everywhere
because it is a fundamental characteristic of human beings. I believe it is one of the things that makes
us uniquely human. I will not argue here
as to whether other animals ever think creatively – that may be a topic for
some future entry – although I can tell you with great certainty: I have looked deep into the eyes of many,
many cows and there is no creativity in there whatsoever! Look for grass. Eat grass.
Chew grass. Chew grass. Chew grass…Nope: cows live in a totally causal world!
Thus, I
say that human beings are "creators".
Whether we evolved from rocks or not, our ideas are not simply
evolutions of previous concepts. They
are not the inevitable reactions of neurons to more and more inputs…they are new thoughts. At least, that is how it feels to us. When we have an “aha” moment, it does not
feel to us that it was inevitable. In my
opinion, that feeling is not an illusion.
I think it is true creativity. I
know I am in the minority with this view, but I don't think you should reject
the concept out of hand. Think about the
possibility. At the very least,
recognize how exciting it would be if it were true. To think that you, as a mere human being,
might have the capability of a true creative act - that is very exciting!
I will
introduce two major criticisms or concerns that come along with the idea of
creativity as an uncaused cause in the paragraphs that follow. But first I want to put forward this
point: if creativity is not uncaused, then creativity as we commonly think of it does not exist. If
creativity is a caused event, then it is just the inevitable conclusion of a
line of previous actions and basically it is like completing a math
problem. It would be like saying that
"I just had an inspiration: when
you add two to two you get four."
That's not creativity as we know it (although the fundamental concept of
addition probably was a creative act, in my opinion). If Picasso's Starry Night or Beethoven's
Fifth Symphony are just the result of a series of previous caused events, then
you can't really call them creative acts.
You might be
tempted to claim that creativity is a random event. But, if that is the case, then we would just
call Picasso and Beethoven "lucky" for their creative acts. That would still not be "creative" as
we generally define it. If true
creativity really does exist, then it must be an uncaused cause in order to
meet our generally accepted definition of the concept.
OK. Now on to two major criticisms of true
creativity. I will briefly introduce
them in this entry, but I'll have to deal with them in more depth in the
future. These are: 1) violation of the laws of physics, and 2)
violation of the omniscience of God.
First,
the problem of true creativity violating the laws of physics. Actually, I think anything in the category of
an uncaused event is in danger of violating the laws of physics. I've heard people claim that if things like
free will and true creativity existed, they would heat up the universe to
oblivion. To be honest, I'm not quite
sure I understand the line of thinking there.
I can see, though, that creativity would seem to violate entropy laws if
"order" can be created without the expenditure of energy. I don't really know that the laws of physics can
be applied to ideas. Can information be
transmitted faster than the speed of light?
In the future, I will explore this in more detail, but for now I will
just say that the concept of randomness seems to hold the key to addressing
this issue. Specifically, you can't
really tell the difference between a random event and an uncaused, or willed,
event as an outside observer. Maybe I
should say that you probably can't
tell the difference. In both cases, you
can't predict the event when given the current state and all the inputs. I tried to start introducing this idea with
what I called "Turing Numbers", but I'm not sure the point of that
came across. But this whole concept will
have to be addressed in a future entry.
Second
is a problem that only some of you care about:
if humans can create something that never existed before, does that mean
God didn't create it? Are human beings
adding to God's creation? Is God
surprised by our new creation? Does he
exclaim "wow - I didn't expect that!"? I admit that, at first glance, the idea that
we could create something that never existed before seems to violate certain
characteristics attributed to God, such as omniscience. To address this issue, I think we should look
at the "multiple paths" idea that you find in quantum physics. Further, the idea that God can create
something that can create something else does not, in my opinion, violate any
commonly-held views regarding the attributes of God. I think that true creativity, like free will,
is actually critical to Christian belief.
But, for the moment, I just want to acknowledge that it could be a
concern and that many people may be uncomfortable with the concept of true
creativity because of it.
I believe
these two issues are addressable. Maybe
there are other issues that people will bring up. But, as I have stated regarding free will, it
is hard for me to feel the logic in rejecting something that is obviously
observable on a daily basis just because it is hard to explain. When I think up a new idea, I experience it as
new - as an act of creation. An idea now
exists that has never existed before.
Scientists create. Artists
create. Musicians create. Writers create. Human beings create. I see it everywhere and I personally
experience it every day. I can't reject the obvious because of the
subtle.
True
creation is almost defined by being a willed event. For example, when is something art? I think something is art when there is a
creative intention behind it. It has to have some component of being a
willed event. I have looked at an item
others call art, and all I see are random scribbles or random splashes of
paint. Is that art? In my opinion, if it really was random, then it is not
art. What makes it art is the intention
of the artist and, sometimes, the ascribed intention by the viewer of the
art. Thus, the creative act of art is a
willed event, not a random event and not a caused event.
OK, there
is obviously much more to this topic that we will have to explore in the
future. But I really encourage you to
think about this concept of creativity. Is
creativity deeper than free will? I
think it might be. Free will is certainly
deeper than consciousness. A lot of
philosophers and scientists talk about the "hard problem of
consciousness" because it seems beyond our current knowledge of physical
laws to resolve how consciousness exists inside of a material brain. But consciousness is simple compared to free
will. Free will is diamond to "the
hard problem of consciousness's" talc!
So what does that make creativity?
True creativity is beyond reason.
In fact, in my view, it is better
than reason. Reason can only explain
what exists, whereas creativity can create what is new. As humans we can express both reason and
creativity. We shouldn't use one to
destroy the other.
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