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Mistaking randomness for free will
Jeffrey P Ebert1, Daniel M Wegner
1Department of Psychology, Harvard University, 33 Kirkland St., Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. jebert@wjh.harvard.edu
Abstract:
Belief in free will is widespread. The present research considered one reason why people may believe that actions are freely chosen rather than determined: they attribute randomness in behavior to free will. Experiment 1 found that participants who were prompted to perform a random sequence of actions experienced their behavior as more freely chosen than those who were prompted to perform a deterministic sequence. Likewise, Experiment 2 found that, all else equal, the behavior of animated agents was perceived to be more freely chosen if it consisted of a random sequence of actions than if it consisted of a deterministic sequence; this was true even when the degree of randomness in agents' behavior was largely a product of their environments. Together, these findings suggest that randomness in behavior--one's own or another's--can be mistaken for free will.
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