Naropa University

ECOLOGICAL SUCCESSION
 AS A METAPHOR FOR
FREE WILL:
The Ecology of Choice

Thesis submitted in partial completion of the requirements in
the Masters in Environmental Leadership
 
 

By

Harv Teitelbaum

May  2000
 
 
 
 

Thesis Committee Members:
 
 

Chair of Thesis Committee
 

Committee Member
 
 

The Thesis of Harv Teitelbaum has been submitted to Naropa University and approved by the Department of Environmental Studies
 
 

Chair Council of the Environmental Studies Department
 
 
 
 
 
 

DEDICATION

To Roberta Richardson, my wife, beloved,
my second heart; and
To Benjamin Teitelbaum, my son, who
redefined my notion of elder
 

ECOLOGICAL SUCCESSION
AS A METAPHOR FOR
FREE WILL:
The Ecology of Choice

Harv Teitelbaum
Master of Arts in Environmental Leadership
Naropa University, May 2000
Anne Z. Parker and Jane E. Bunin, Committee Members

Abstract

 One question that has occupied humanity, from kings and philosophers to ordinary individuals, is whether our thoughts and actions are the result of free will, determinism, or some complex composite of the two.  Likewise in the field of ecological succession, there has been a continuing dialogue regarding the extent of the effects of determinism, predictability, and individualism on overall patterns.
 The thesis suggests there may be insights gained from the examination of ecological successional processes and theory which inform our understanding and enhance the dialogue concerning free will.
 The state of the science of successional theory is reviewed, with emphasis on how this science has evolved from the time of F.E. Clements to current thinking.
 The concepts of free will and self-interest are similarly examined by reviewing some of the major Western, European contributions to this field.  To further illuminate the free will concept, in recognition of the limitations inherent in formal Western thought, and to honor the immeasurable contributions of other traditions, this review is then extended beyond the Eurocentric model to include viewpoints from other wisdom traditions and from fiction.
 The examinations of ecological succession and free will are then synthesized and reflected upon from a systems perspective to arrive at insights concerning free will and human futures.

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ....................................................vii
TABLES AND FIGURES ....................................................viii
CHAPTERS
 I. PREFACE-OFFERING ....................................................1
 II. INTRODUCTION AND FORMAT .....................................4
 III. CONUNDRUMS ..........................................................8
 IV. RESEARCH METHODS ................................................11
 V. LITERATURE OVERVIEW .............................................14
 VI. CONCEPTUAL METHODS-Systems Theory ........................19
   Metaphor .......................................................................32
 VII. ECOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE
   Literature Review of Ecological Succession ..............................36
   Disturbance, Landscape Ecology, and Scale .............................49
VIII. FREE WILL
   Literature Review .............................................................60
   Self-Interest ....................................................................75
   Perspectives from Other Wisdom Traditions .............................86
   Two Fictional Perspectives on Free Will ..................................96
 IX. SYNTHESIS ...............................................................102
 X. REFLECTIONS ............................................................107
 XI. BIBLIOGRAPHY .........................................................120

           vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

 I wish to acknowledge those without whom this composition would have been greatly diminished.
 Jane E. Bunin, president of Natural Science Associates, Inc., and Lee Klinger, of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, were both exceedingly generous with their time, thoughts, and research papers.
 From a volcanic island near the coast of Sicily, Elena Franzini, creator of the “Gardener of Myself” psychosynthesis metaphor and workshop, created a proprietary internet site where we were able to share documents and thoughts on metaphor.
 Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, World Wisdom Scholar at Naropa University, and Judith Simmer-Brown, Religious Studies Department Chair at Naropa University, both responded to my inquiries into their respective traditions’ views on free will with delightful and stimulating insight.
 Last, I am extremely grateful to Dr. Bunin, Anne Z. Parker, Environmental Studies Department Chair at Naropa University, and Dr. Roberta M. Richardson, for their thoughtful feedback on my initial draft.

TABLES
 
 

Table
 1. Ecosystem attributes and tendencies at early and late successional stages......45
 

FIGURES
 

Figure
 1. Simplified representation of scales of incorporation ...............................52
 

CHAPTER I

PREFACE-OFFERING

 On October 1, 1999, the date of my wife’s birthday, Roberta and I decided to go for a hike in Golden Gate Park.  It was a glorious fall day, with blue skies and light winds enhancing the colors and vibrancy of the pines and waters accompanying us on our climb.  It soon became so warm that I questioned my choice of long pants and flannel-lined shirt.  We rested on a flat rock in the shade of a ponderosa just off the trail.  After a while of sitting in silence, we heard and then saw the approach of an older couple, he leading her down the rocky trail.  Without a glance or word to each other, Roberta and I decided to remain motionless and silent, to see if we could remain undetected by the travelers.  After they had passed without noticing us, Roberta and I shared a laugh as well as metaphors for our behavior, she the camouflaged prey, I the stealthy predator.
 We continued our climb until we reached a crossroads, whereupon we decided to take the more difficult trail leading to a rock outcropping and then back down to the trailhead.  Apparently, what made this trail difficult was its lack of definition through the various terrains it traversed.  Initially, however, I took pleasure in the ambiguity and in my apparent skill at successfully tracking even the slightest hint of a trail.
 We arrived at the rock outcropping, enjoying the high views and the pleasures of our good health and fortune.  We began our descent, following the now frequent, trail marking poles.  In short order we were lost.  We had just passed a pole and continued on in what seemed the appropriate direction, only to be confronted with a landscape devoid of markers or any signs of human egress.  Roberta thought there were indications of a trail below.  I hadn’t a clue.
 After a time, I suggested that the only sensible thing would be to retrace our steps by revisiting the last trail marker.  As we approached it, we were surprised to see a companion trail marker, not more than fifteen feet from the first.  I was puzzled.  How did that get there?  Could that really have been there all along?  I thought I had gotten pretty good at “hearing” these markers, and yet this one had remained silent to our original passage.
 As we hiked past this new marker, now confident in our direction and seeing the next marker in the distance, I thought I heard laughter behind me.
 Leave it to the Trickster to turn my notion of who is the predator and who is the prey on its ear, to teach me that the wondrous lesson of being comfortable with ambiguity extends only as far as the open embrace and not to pride or arrogance.
 I shared a laugh over these lessons with my companions.  As we continued our descent under graying skies and an increasingly cold wind, I pulled my flannel shirt tighter and watched my breath begin to frost in the late afternoon air.

CHAPTER II

INTRODUCTION AND FORMAT

 As an activist, I often address bouts of profound cynicism and a sense of inevitability by embracing the ideal that all one can ultimately do is learn, care and act.  But this begs a question.  Are there larger forces at work that render individual efforts fruitless?  On some higher plane, is the future predetermined?  Back on the human scale, how much choice do we really have?
 The possibility that we may not fully possess the quality of free will is unsettling and seems to go against the tenets of Western culture.  We appear to make decisions freely and independently, weighing our choices against our perceived self-interests.  Perhaps it is, in part, anthropocentrism, a human-centered view of the universe, or Eurocentrism, which provokes an almost reflexive denial of anything short of absolute free will.  This bias leads us to think we are special, different, and somehow immune to the same causal imperatives often assigned to those other beings and systems we observe, measure, and manipulate.
 Western culture has traditionally attributed the greatest measure of free will to humans or at least to the “higher” animals.  If doubt is introduced and clouds the certainty of human free will, the distance between humans and other beings and communities regarding this and other qualities might also narrow.
 While we may become less sure of our own freedom, other living systems for which we have presumed only mathematical predictability may on some levels be exercising measures of free will similar to our own.  The qualities we label free will and determinism may, to a not very dissimilar degree, be present or absent in other living things, if not in all systems.
 The thesis therefore being presented is that free will, at least in its most ultimate sense and to the degree to which it has been assumed to exist in humans, is an illusion.  This illusion nonetheless serves to optimize the ultimate health of the species through the maximization of self-interest.
 While there may be no positive proof of the above assertions, an analogy or metaphor can be made using the behavior of plant communities.  Through evolution, plant species have developed strategies for survival and maximum benefit.  We might say that individuals and species act according to their best self-interest.  By examining the collective behavior of plant communities over time in an ecosystem, that is, by considering ecological succession, we may be able to further our understanding of how free will and determinism apply to both human and plant communities.  This in turn may have relevance for contemplating human destiny, as well as our connection, understanding, and love for the non-human universe.
 I will proceed not by utilizing a direct, linear argument for or against free will.  Instead, I will employ systems theory, the conceptual method which considers the world to be composed not of isolated parts, but of a hierarchy of parts-wholes and relationships, to contemplate both free will and successional theory.  In so doing, I hope to illuminate, and add a new perspective to, the free will dialogue.
 The reviews of the literature begin with an Overview regarding the basic metaphor and the thesis as a whole.  The Literature Review then proceeds as a major review of the history and state of the science of succession.  It is at once an examination of the evolution of successional theory, an honoring of the contributors to the field, and a foundation for the metaphor  relating to free will.
 I have taken the liberty of combining what is essentially a Literature Review of the traditional contributions to the philosophy of free will with my own contemplations and responses, honoring the form of the classical dialogue.  A review of the free will corollary of self-interest proceeds from this dialogue.
 The Ecological Perspective and Free Will sections of this thesis are written almost as stand-alone elements.  Yet they are infused and defined by the thread, or river, of systems thinking which runs through them, as well as by the foundational question posed by the thesis and its primary metaphor.  I have attempted to facilitate the remembrance of these threads by the use of cross metaphors and cross terminology within the elements.
 It is my hope that the reader will be taken on a journey that informs as well as provokes.  I will lastly synthesize the threads and elements with my own conclusions concerning how ecological succession relates to free will, and then reflect upon the implications of those conclusions.

CONUNDRUMS

 There were three issues which arose before and during the examination of this thesis.  I first debated the use of the device of “metaphor”, as defined below.  Second, could metaphor effectively be used to illuminate the concept of free will?  Last, as my understanding of both succession and free will evolved, would the overlapping qualities I had envisioned disappear, rendering the thesis’ metaphor invalid?
 The dictionary defines “metaphor” as “one thing conceived as representing another; a symbol” (American Heritage 1993).  As my intent was to conceive of succession as representative of the prevalence of free will and determinism, I felt reasonably confident in using the term.
 It might have been possible for the thesis to have been titled, “Ecological Succession as a Metaphor for Determinism”.  I could have also entitled the thesis, “Ecological Succession as a Metaphor for the Free Will-Determinism Debate.”  Perhaps I settled upon the existing title to reflect the common presumption of free will, even in the face of the strong arguments to the contrary.  Or perhaps the title chose me.
 By linking human will and successional behavior, I suggest that both are contained within a larger realm, one we might call choice.
 I also reject the belief that will and free will are solely human qualities.  I attribute this to anthropocentrism, the belief that humans are special, distinct, and unique.  Instead, whenever an aspect of our species is offered as proof of our uniqueness and distinctiveness, such as tool-making, culture, social structures, or language, other species are found to exhibit similar attributes (Wilson 1978).  The lesson is that caution must be used when presuming uniqueness for human qualities.  The notion of free will, to the extent valid at all, could apply to other biological and perhaps even non-biological systems.
 In a sense, therefore, the linkage of the two themes is not only valid as metaphor, but as something more.  Successional behavior and human will may not only be related metaphorically, but may both be manifestations, and subsets, of natural will.
 Before researching plant succession, I held the simplistic view that it was a fairly predictable and linear process proceeding from colonization to climax, during which successively larger and more complex species facilitated their own replacement through self-interested behavior.  I also believed that free will was impossible and an illusion.  By focusing on how the self-interested behavior of plants nonetheless inexorably led to a decline in dominance for many species, I hoped to suggest a similar, fatalistic determinism for humans.  Western society, too, seems to be primarily driven by self-interest suggesting, perhaps, our eventual marginalization.
 The simplistic view of succession to which I subscribed was not altogether false.  Just as with the “laws” of Isaac Newton, which are accurate and valid under many circumstances, but less so under certain scales and conditions, modern views of succession incorporate some of the older, foundational ideas.  Systems theory teaches that wholes, while displaying emergent properties, nonetheless still contain their parts intact (Bertalanffy 1950).  Our political structure may have evolved from family, to clan, to tribe, and to nation, but the family still persists.  As my understanding of free will and succession evolved, my original conceptions still retained validity, and some of the connections originally envisioned remained intact.

RESEARCH METHODS

 I began with an hypothesis, that plant species, acting in accordance with their own natures and in their apparent self-interests, nonetheless pave the way for their own decline.  In addition this was, for me, analogous to the fate of humanity, which arrogantly presumes possession of infinite choice and free will, while perhaps rushing headlong into an unalterable and more humbling future.  Around and from this one notion, I attempted to construct a field of illumination and clarification.
 The two elements of the metaphor, free will and ecological succession, had no established connections, conjoining body of literature, or cross-disciplinary experts.  As such, I decided to first separate the two elements, pursue and scrutinize each, and then reconnect and synthesize.
 For ecological succession, a field with which I was only glancingly familiar, I sought out local experts.  I interviewed Jane Bunin, ecologist, consultant and teacher.  From her extensive library of resource materials, Dr. Bunin offered me a substantial assortment of papers and texts on traditional successional theory and related fields.
 I also interviewed Lee Klinger, a geophysiologist traditionally trained in ecology, who is now often engaged in more controversial ecological thought and research.  Dr. Klinger presented me with many of his papers and research dealing with some of the frontiers and controversial theories of succession.
 From my interviews with these two learned individuals, and through the readings they proffered and to which I was tangentially led, I was able to construct a review of the history and state of the science of ecological succession.
 Compared to the somewhat “harder” science of ecology, my examination of the philosophy of free will was more wide ranging, combining an historical review of some of the major contributors to the discipline with my own meditations and responses.  For this element, I set out to find the most comprehensive anthological reviews available emanating from the Western tradition.  The works of Gary Watson, Kelly Rogers, Sidney Morgenbesser, and James Walsh were especially valuable in this regard.  To properly honor perspectives from other traditions, however, simply interpreting text seemed insufficient, even disrespectful.
 For the three traditions represented by my People, place and learning community, that is, Judaism, Native American, and Buddhism, respectively, I sought out respected voices.  Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi holds special significance as an elder who spans and honors many traditions with his teachings and reflections.  Known and respected by many around the world, Reb Zalman was generous with his time and contributions.  Dik Darnell, raised in the Lakota community, was known to me for many years and graciously offered his insights.  I also had the pleasure of taking a Buddhist-oriented course with Judith Simmer-Brown at Naropa.  The knowledge I gained during my interview with Dr. Simmer-Brown on Buddhist conceptions of free will and cetana was indispensable.
 My research methodology thus reflected a continuum from a somewhat more scientific approach to increasing levels of reflection.  The progression and format of the thesis reflects this.  Following the Free Will segment, the Synthesis and Reflections components represent more outright contemplation, perhaps indicative of the heretofore under-examined relationship between natural and anthropological choice.

LITERATURE OVERVIEW

 The notion of considering ecological succession a metaphor for human free will has not, to the best of my knowledge, been previously considered.  My search for literature in this regard did not result in any specific published works.  I did, however, find an internet page published by Dr. David Hargreave of Western Michigan University, entitled “Ecological Succession as a Model for Human Behavior” (Hargreave 1999).  Hargreave refers to the two different resource conservation or nutrient cycling strategies of early and late successional species, rapid growth versus competitive/cooperative strategies, respectively called the “r” and “K” selection factors, as models for the choices humans face for long-term survival.  Not only was this work relevant to the notion of human choice and futures, but it also represented a scholarly validation of the concept of using successional processes to inform human aspects.
 The further task, therefore, was to uncover the relevant literature for each of the subtextual elements.  Regarding succession, this manifested in a review of the foundational works of F. E. Clements and H. A. Gleason.  Foremost among these were “Plant succession: an analysis of the development of vegetation” (Clements 1926) and “The structure and development of the plant association” (Gleason 1917).
 As sometimes happens in emerging disciplines such as ecology, there next transpired a period during which work seemed to fall into either one of these two “camps”, supporting either Clements’ “organismic” thesis or Gleason’s “individualistic” antithesis.  Even today, many contributors categorize their views along this supposedly one-dimensional continuum.  This was suggestive of the debates between the Libertarians, who believed in free will, and the Determinists, who did not.  Eventually, this debate was supplanted by one centered on the question of whether free will and determinism could coexist.  In other words, there was a growing realization that there could be truth and value in both sides of both debates.
 In the 1940’s, ‘50’s and ‘60’s, the works of Raymond Lindeman, Eugene Odum and others introduced notions of ecosystem development and disturbance.  This more open-system approach continues with thinkers such as D. B. Botkin, R. H. Whittaker, S. T. A. Pickett and Lee Klinger, who question the traditional notions of predictability, climax communities, disturbance, and linearity.  For example, recent thinking stresses individual life cycles and opportunity or limitation dynamics of colonization (Whittaker 1953).
 Reviewing literature pertinent to the notion of free will versus determinism presented a somewhat different challenge, reflecting the more amorphous nature of this philosophical dialogue.  Here the journey began with anthological reviews in the areas of free will and self-interest.  These usually covered the traditional European contributors such as Plato, Spinoza, Hume, Kant, James and Dewey.
 As all these represented a more Western focus, it was desirable that I obtain views on these subjects from other world wisdom traditions, in order to broaden the perspectives which would subsequently inform my reflections.  These included the Buddhist perspective, interpreted through the works of Joanna Macy and Herbert V. Guenther, a Jewish perspective alluding to the Torah and rabbinical commentary, and a Native American perspective.  These three traditions represent my current educational training at Naropa, my historical and ethnic essence, and my home’s natural history, respectively.  It is important to honor the fact that there are many diverse perspectives within each of these three traditions, while acknowledging the limitations of this thesis’ space and focus.
 For an additional perspective, I also sought out fictional interpretations, or metaphors, of the debate between free will and determinism as manifested by two very different authors: William Shakespeare and Isaac Asimov.
 Flowing through the two landscapes of succession and free will are the rivers of metaphor and systems theory.  Systems theory asserts that there are patterns and relationships common to all systems and their components (Kauffman 1980).  In other words, there are general principles that apply to the internal processes of a human being that are transferable to the internal processes of a community, a car, or a corporation.
 As systems thinking was a major component of my educational journey at Naropa and is now embedded in my thinking, it was the method I chose to examine the relationships between the two elements.  The following chapter provides an overview of systems theory.  For this, I relied on the works of Gregory Bateson, L. von Bertalanffy, Morris Berman, Ilya Prigogine, Elizabeth Sahtouris, Elena Franzini, and Joanna Macy.  Of these, Elizabeth Sahtouris’ illuminating work Earthdance (Sahtouris 1995) and Ilya Prigogine’s Order Out of Chaos (Prigogine and Stengers 1984) greatly informed my understanding of systems theory as applied to living and non-living environments.
 I relied upon practical definitions and examples to indirectly illuminate the concept of metaphor within the various sections of this thesis.  As is common with systems approaches, many of the works referenced above informed more than one aspect of this thesis, such as Joanna Macy’s Mutual Causality in Buddhism and General Systems Theory (Macy 1991), which deals with both systems thinking and Buddhism.

CHAPTER VI

CONCEPTUAL METHODS-Systems Theory

 Throughout this work, I employ conceptual processes known collectively as systems thinking.  A complementing discipline, similar but not completely identical, is known as living systems theory.  These ways of thinking define the pathways by which ecological succession and free will will be envisioned and linked.  An overview of systems thinking, with some allusions to the two sides of the metaphor, follows.
 At the core of systems theory is the notion that the whole is more than the sum of its parts (Bertalanffy 1950).  This contrasts with the more atomistic view that ultimate knowledge is to be found only by reducing an object to its components.
 Under this latter approach, the object under study would need be put under stressful examination and forced to reveal its parts and properties.  Francis Bacon, one of the leading proponents of this reductionist approach in the seventeenth century, termed it natura vexa, “nature annoyed”.  As a philosophic and scientific approach, this is often known as the Cartesian approach, named after René Descartes, who believed that only those things which could be known for certain had real meaning (Berman 1981).  The universe was then deterministic, governed by Isaac Newton’s laws of motion and physics.  With enough vexing and measuring, all real events could be predicted from current and past information.
 Descartes and Bacon also believed, as do many people today including some ecologists and philosophers, that humans and the human mind were separate and detached from Nature.  This Cartesian approach isolated observer and observed, and limited the extent and reach of “mind” (Bateson 1972).
 Asserting that the whole is more than the sum of its parts implies that there are emergent properties in the whole which are not present in the parts.  For instance, an unrelated man, woman, and child do not exhibit the same properties as a family composed of the same elements.  A pile of bricks, wood, and glass, when arranged in a certain manner, can become a building with properties not present in its components.  To fully understand either the building or the family, an examination of a brick or an individual would be insufficient.
 A corollary of this foundational notion is the fact that wholes themselves become parts in other emergent organizations.  In the examples above, several buildings could result in a development, several families in a community, and so on.  These progressive emergents are said to be at different system levels than their component parts/wholes.  Viewed as one large system, we see a hierarchical pyramid of levels, perhaps culminating in some universal or theological end-point, e.g. -cell-tissue-organ-organism-species-biosphere-ecosphere-.  Concerning this hierarchy of levels, the philosopher J. K. Feibleman formulated “Laws of the Levels”, one of which states:
 

 The mechanism of any level is found at lower levels (in its parts), while the purpose of any level is found at levels above (in the wholes) (Feibleman 1954).

  This is the key to natural ethics--that the self-interest of (every) level or layer in a holarchy is the best possible strategy, for only by means of that strategy can   mutual consistency work itself out among all levels    (Sahtouris 1995).

 In such a state, certain fluctuations, instead of regressing, may be amplified and invade the entire system, compelling it to evolve toward a new regime that may be qualitatively quite different from the stationary states corresponding to minimum entropy production (page 140).

 Prigogine and Stengers called these regimes “dissipative structures”, which in classical theory is almost a contradiction in terms.  Thermodynamic energy, a dissipative waste product in classical physics, now becomes a source of order.
 The implications of this are enormous.  Rather than being the exception, dissipative structures appear to be the norm in living systems.  In these far from equilibrium states, thresholds appear to be reached where isotropic order (homogeneity and consistency in all directions) is broken and new states can emerge.  One can see this in the development of the embryo, where developmental “jumps” are followed by periods of relative qualitative inactivity.  In systems language, this is called “punctuated equilibrium”.  We also learn from this that system changes are eventually non-linear, an important and perhaps hopeful consideration for activists to keep in mind in these times of runaway ecological exploitation and corporate control of society.
 Another fascinating aspect of emergence is that it occurs in systems that we would not have termed “living”, such as fluids affected by heat or gravity (Prigogine and Stengers 1984).  Nonetheless, these systems exhibit the properties of self-organization and transcendence.  Could life itself be simply an emergent property, a “natural” consequence of systems self-organizing into structures of increasing complexity?  Could the realms of organic and inorganic be arbitrarily defined and limited by humans?  Again I am reminded of the Batesonian concept of mind, where it begins and ends.  Perhaps it is telling that Morris Berman’s book on Batesonian thinking is called The Reenchantment of the World, while the last chapter of Prigogine and Stengers’ book is entitled, “The Reenchantment of Nature”.
 We have discovered that the universe is not as deterministic as conceived by Bacon, Descartes and Newton and, in so doing, have returned somewhat to the pre-“Enlightenment”, organismic metaphors of Aristotle and the ancient Greeks.  As Berman states in discussing Heisenberg, uncertainty, and quantum mechanics, “(Heisenberg is saying) that consciousness is part of the measurement and therefore reality...is inherently blurry, or indeterminate” (Berman 1981).
 On the other hand, it is tempting to romanticize the pre-Cartesian, non-discursive approach to mind and thought, and in so doing, undervalue causality.  I am reminded of the witch hunts and religious persecutions that occurred in those times as a result of fear and superstition.  True holism, it seems, might therefore encompass both holistic and reductionist approaches.  Neither is by itself right or wrong, good or bad.
 In conclusion, to the systems way of thinking, dualities and couplings predominate.  Differentiation-integration, stability-transformation, embeddedness-independence, symmetry-asymmetry, convergence-chaos, competition-cooperation, inhibition-facilitation, optimization-maximization, free will-determinism; these are some of the dances of Nature, the yin and the yang.

 Human language, and to a great extent, human thought, have both evolved through metaphor.  The word itself derives from a Greek word meaning “to carry over” (Batchelor, Howard, “Metaphor,” in The New Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, Release 6).  We now no longer think of the original metaphor contained in the word “metaphor”, which some would therefore label a dead metaphor, like “leg of a table” (Perrine, Laurence, “Figures of Speech,” in The New Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, Release 6).  However, I prefer to think of these “dead” metaphors as very much living, but on a different systems level.  What was “as” has become “is”.  The “leg” of the table no longer directly evokes thoughts of body parts, but the analogy has now been internalized, modifying our mental construct of this part of the table’s anatomy.
 In this there appears a bit of co-evolution and systems.  We have, in a sense, consumed the original metaphors, metabolized and endowed them with new significance.  Through human intention and within the framework of mind, metaphor is transformed into emergent understanding.
 Personification, a subtype of metaphor, is a device by which human qualities are assigned to nonhuman objects.  This might be exemplified by male car fanatics conceiving of their vehicles as women or lovers.  In the case of this thesis, I might be accused of personifying successional processes as akin to human free will.  On the other hand, a living system may qualitatively differ from a mechanical artifact like a car, and humans approximate living systems sufficiently, to not be personification at all.  Ecological succession might be a different systems level whole within which free will, manifested as self-interested choice, is a part.  Rather than “as” the thesis’ metaphor may represent an “is”.
 The reptilian design upon which the human eye is based is not in itself apparent, yet it represents the continuation of the processes of evolution and complexity (Calvin 1986).  Microbes that were among the earliest “living” things on earth may or may not still be the predominant planetary beings, but they underlie all life that has emerged since (Woese, Kandler, and Wheelis 1990).  Similarly, one of the values of metaphors is that they have the potential to influence and facilitate an emerging, evolving, common consciousness, in effect acting as an environmental influence on the open system of mind.
 Metaphors are considered to be a function of the right side of the brain.  The left side is generally connected with what we define as logical, rational thought.  The left side could be said to be where “parts” dwell, while the right side is the territory of “wholes”, emergents, revelations, and connections.  The right brain takes the data from the left and “synthesizes” it into higher level understanding (Franzini 1999).
 Neither right nor left can do the job alone.  As in systems theory, the beginning of wisdom is not in the parts, in this case the hemispheres, but in the process and the relationship.  Just as in the case of the Cartesian/Batesonian dichotomy, it is the interplay, the dance between the two partners, that leads to creativity and structure.
 Metaphors are slowly finding their way into mainstream scientific research and discourse.  The small but emerging field of psychosynthesis looks at the mind’s ability to create metaphor.  Ecological succession is being envisioned through what are essentially metaphors of chaos theory and fractals (Klinger 1999).
 In living systems, creativity is a function of the margins or edges, the physical and figurative territory where conditions are stressed or in flux.  In the hemispheric view of mind, creativity and metaphor reside in the right brain.  The question arises, then, as to whether and how it might be possible to stimulate metaphoric creativity.  One possible way may be through meditation.  Meditation is theorized to be a right-brain function, and for many, is a pathway to opening spaces which invite new possibilities and creations.  As will be discussed later, it may also be a pathway toward higher levels of consciousness, thought, and free will.

ECOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

Literature Review of Ecological Succession

 Frederick Edward Clements was born in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1874.  Early on he developed a love of wildflowers, studying and collecting them, eventually becoming expertly familiar with the plants and grasses of the high plains and Rocky Mountain ecosystems.  Later in life, after an academic career of writing and teaching, he would return to the western grasslands of Colorado, Arizona, and California as a restorationist.
 While largely credited with being the originator of successional theory, it is important to realize that much formal scientific work had already been done in Europe, work of which Clements, an avid reader of the scientific literature, must surely have been aware.  It has also been pointed out (Barbour 1996) that Clements’ academically formative years took place during a time of great flowering in the movements of holism and ecology, no doubt coloring his theories.
 Perhaps most significant is that indigenous and aboriginal Peoples around the world had been making use of successional concepts and processes for millennia.  This is most evident in the near-universal use of fire among Native Peoples as a cultural, ceremonial and environmental tool.  By employing fire as a means of ecotone (transitional zone, margin, or edge) and gap creation, or to keep ecosystems in what Eugene Odum would later call “bloom” stages (Odum 1969), these Peoples were and are able to manipulate their environment to provide food, security, medicine, etc.  However, since they coexisted closely with their environment, making their interest in successional processes immensely present and practical, traditional wisdom has only recently begun to receive appropriate attention and appreciation from historically Eurocentric academics.
 In 1916 Clements published what is still the seminal work in plant ecology and succession, Plant Succession: An Analysis of the Development of Vegetation (Clements 1916).  Clements had observed tendencies in vegetation to organize into associations, later to be called communities.  He considered these associations to be analogous to organisms, undergoing successive life stages such as adolescence, maturity, and death, hence the characterization of Clements’ theory as the “organismic” model.
 Since the nature of these associations was influenced by local conditions, such as seed dispersal, species proximity, geography, hydrology, and climate, what we now call “allogenic” factors (those outside the control of the organism), like communities were expected to be relatively homogeneous in composition over a large area.  When disturbed, Clements predicted that the original communities would eventually reestablish themselves in stages tending toward their pre-disturbance state in equilibrium with the local climate.
 The process of moving toward this end state was termed “succession” and, in Clements view, resulted in one possible “climax” association for each patch or unit.  We might therefore categorize his “association-unit” model as being somewhat linear, deterministic, and monoclimactic.  As a “whole” the community self-organizes under the influence of the flow-through of local abiotic (non-organic) and micro-climatic factors.
 Almost immediately, however, in just the same manner as reductionism was reasserting itself against holism (Barbour 1996), H. A. Gleason proposed an alternative view of succession (Gleason 1917, 1926), a theory that, despite the success of reductionism in reasserting itself, was to remain under- appreciated for 30 years.  Gleason’s theories had to await the death of Clements in 1945, and with it the silencing of a great oratorical and academic presence, before receiving renewed examination and the public acknowledgment of silent supporters.  Within a very short span of time, however, it became the more dominant of the two theories.  In 1948 Gleason was named President of the Botanical Society of America, an honor not awarded Clements.
 Henry Allen Gleason was born in 1882 in Illinois.  Like Clements he had a love of wildflowers, and would eventually publish multiple works dealing with the plants of the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada.  Though just 8 years younger than Clements, Gleason would spend much of his professional life in the shadow of the renowned ecologist.
 In Gleason’s view, the association had nothing in common with an organism.  Rather than each community being a coherent emergent, the association was merely the perceived result of many species’ and individuals’ attempts to maximize their life histories independently and individualistically under similar climatic and abiotic conditions.  Seemingly identical patches in the same area only appeared to be so to the casual observer, revealing significant variation upon closer study.  Variations in composition were due to more random factors such as competition and chance.  As a result variation was roughly proportional to the distance separating patches.
 Clements’ organismic model would therefore be no more than an illusion, a subjective construct or, at best, a metaphor.  Gleason’s “individualistic” successional model was less deterministic, less linear, and resulted in more of a continuum of possible climaxes.  He took the more reductionist approach of seeing successional behavior as the “resultant of forces”, the sum total of the actions of the species-parts, while dismissing the association-wholes.
 Once Clements’ theories were no longer held as gospel and therefore open to refutation or alteration, others proposed models for succession and pathways toward mature, steady-state, or climax stages.  Although there were many contributors to the field, I will touch upon several who might be regarded as among the most influential in the Western scientific tradition, if judged by the frequency of citation in the literature.
 Arthur Tansley expanded the notion of climax community to reflect the varying sum totals of the influences of allogenic factors such as topography, slope, and animal behavior over a given landscape.  The result would be a mosaic of possible climaxes, or a poly-climax regime.  Tansley is also credited with coining the word “ecosystem”, and defining it as the associative unit (or community) formed by organisms interacting with each other and their abiotic environment (Tansley 1935).
 The ecosystem concept was expanded upon by Raymond Lindeman, who defined succession as “the process of development of an ecosystem”.  He viewed this development as being governed by “the effects of the organisms on the environment and upon each other”, ultimately tending toward a stable or equilibrium state (Lindeman 1942).  Eugene Odum would subsequently employ this term, “development”, in his contributions to the field, perhaps reinforcing the growing perception of the process as less than absolutely linear and predictable as Clements and the term “succession” had originally implied.
 Lindeman called his approach the “trophic-dynamic” approach, “trophic” referring to nutrition, reflecting its emphasis on productivity and nutrient cycling.  An interesting consequence of the trophic-dynamic approach was that, by offering the possibility of quantifying productive efficiencies, it was perhaps the first to suggest possible mathematical models and tools for ecological and developmental measurement (McIntosh 1981).
 Robert Whittaker expanded upon Tansley’s poly-climax model with his own “climax-pattern” theory.  While still retaining a somewhat deterministic outlook, communities were now free to develop along an infinite number of successional pathways, each resulting in a unique climax.  Climax was seen as the result of both allogenic and autogenic (plant-induced) factors and changes, incorporating the contributions of Lindeman and others.  Succession was no longer seen as unidirectional, and could result in multi-directional shifts and even regressions in response to changing conditions.  Furthermore, Whittaker was one of the first to suggest that the “mature” forest may not always represent the climax phase.  There was evidence in support of climax grasslands or steady-state peat-bog ecosystems (Whittaker 1953; Gibson 1996; Klinger 1991).
 While Whittaker was a supporter of Gleason, and his theories built upon the latter’s continuum-based notions of succession, Eugene Odum appeared to take up the holistic mantle of Clements’ community-association with his classic, The Strategy of Ecosystem Development (Odum 1969).  Odum offered a systems view of succession, not only comparing it to the development of an organism, but extending the analogy to “the development of human society”.  He compared species’ successional strategies to the evolutionary strategy of “maximizing protection” from disturbance or perturbation.  Perhaps in a reflection of the times, he made the point of comparing this “maximum protection” with humanity’s proclivity toward maximum production and consumption.  As such, Odum was among the first to find political, economic, and social relevance in successional theory.  He drew the contrast between what he saw as Nature’s strategy of developing toward mature ecosystems where the ratio of production to biomass (P/B) was low, and humanity’s strategy of preserving, through agricultural and technological intervention/disturbance, early successional “bloom” stages, where production was high compared to biomass.
 Developing ecosystems tend to accumulate increasing varieties of plant species.  Those that were perhaps dominant in earlier successional stages persist in later stages, but in less dominant numbers.  Through successive communities there is a tendency for diversity, and perhaps stability, to be enhanced.  This dynamic equilibrium, or homeostasis, maximizes the community’s chances of withstanding perturbation.
 Henry S. Horn would dispute this assertion that the mature and diverse ecosystem was more stable than the immature (Horn 1974).  Horn felt that diversity and maturity instead represented increased fragility.  Put another way, more-developed ecosystems had further to fall from a catastrophic event than ecosystems in the colonizing phase, although the mature had developed mechanisms to accommodate a range of disturbance which might more significantly affect the early successional stage.  For this reason, said Horn, we should be more protective of mature ecosystems than developing ones.
 One of Odum’s greatest contributions was the codification of ecosystem attributes, indicating trends and tendencies for different successional stages (Table 1).  Odum, using the organismic labels of “young” and “mature”, summarized by attributing the strategies of production, growth, and quantity to the developing ecosystem, and protection, stability, and quality to the mature.

TABLE 1
ECOSYSTEM ATTRIBUTES AND TENDENCIES AT EARLY
AND LATE SUCCESSIONAL STAGES

                                             Early                              Late
   Attribute                             Successional Stage          Successional Stage

Ecosystem Structure
-Plant size                                Small                                   Large
-Species diversity                      Low                                     High
  (variety and distribution)
-Trophic structure                     Mostly producers              Mixture of producers,
                                                                                      consumers, decomposers
-Niches                                    Few, generalized              Many, specialized
-Organization/                          Low                                 High
information/communication
 

Sources:
 Odum, Eugene P. “The Strategy of Ecosystem Development,” Science  (The American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1969) 164: 262-270, Table 1.
 Miller, G.T.  Living in the Environment: Principles, Connections and Solutions, 9th ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company,1996) 149, Table 6-1.

 Odum also discussed “pulse” stability, employing a metaphor for what others have referred to as the “flux” of nature (Pickett and Ostfeld 1995) and I have alluded to as a “dance”.  Odum uses “pulse” to describe the cycles created by succession and regression through regular disturbance which result in the maintenance of ecosystems within a relatively narrow successional band.
 Somewhere along the temporal gradient in the study of succession, contributors became less concerned with the organismic-individualistic debate and more concerned with the mechanics of development.  For instance, Clements had referred to the response of existing species in an association toward potential successor species as “reaction”.  W. H. Drury and I. C. T. Nesbit, in their discussion of the importance of stress and adaptive strategies in successional theory, hypothesized that replacement was the competitive result of one species suppressing others, at least temporarily (Drury and Nesbit 1973).  J. H. Connell and R. O. Slayer built upon these notions to develop their facilitation, inhibition, and tolerance model (Connell and Slayer 1977).  Especially in early succession, pioneer species may change the local environment sufficiently to facilitate their own replacement.  Other early successional species have been observed to produce toxins or otherwise affect conditions to inhibit their own replacement.  In more “mature” ecosystems, plant communities may neither facilitate nor inhibit, but instead tolerate, allowing for a more diverse, narrowly-niched landscape.
 As research increasingly focuses on more specialized processes and observations, it is interesting to note the urge to nonetheless declare an allegiance to either Clements or Gleason in one’s work.  The majority of literature relating to successional theory begins with some sort of overview and critique of the two polar standard bearers.  Interestingly, often the side taken and the philosophy espoused do not significantly accord with one or conflict with the other.
 To illustrate, while Lindeman’s trophic-dynamic theory was individualistic and reductionist, it nonetheless incorporated Clements’ notions of reaction and coaction.  Whittaker’s climax-pattern hypothesis doesn’t so much dismiss associations and climax as it does change the scale of the patch and the numbers of possible climax communities.
 The question of whether Clements intended his comparison of plant associations to organisms to be literal or metaphoric is open to question. He himself called for more research into the mechanics and processes occurring below the surface of succession.
 Clements’ seemingly holistic model contained linear and deterministic aspects that were more indicative of reductionism.  Gleason’s theories, by positing continuums and non-linearity, contained elements of holism.
 The plant association is more than just a human construct, an abstraction when viewed from a distance.  There are real shifts in dominant species and in the compositional nature of communities.  In the same manner as a fetus develops, there are shifts along the continuum; the punctuated equilibria of systems theory.  In classical successional theory, both the individualistic and organismic views have validity.  In the broadest sense, holism encompasses reductionism.  Perhaps that is why, even today, some researchers continue the quest for a unifying theory, one grand explanation for succession.

Disturbance, Landscape Ecology and Scale

 Recent ecological thinking has tended to focus on process.  Foremost in the field are disturbance and landscape ecology.
 Clements considered disturbance an event interfering with succession.  The definition and nature of disturbance is still the subject of research.  How much of disturbance is actually facilitative to the evolution of certain species and the overall health of an ecosystem?  What disturbance regimes are associated with certain ecosystems?  If disturbance events possess both beneficial and predictable aspects, is the word “disturbance” itself inappropriate?  The word “perturbation” has been used by some ecologists, but even this term may be misleading.
 For example, wind in a ponderosa forest, as I have already discussed, can range in effect from a beneficial de-needling, cleansing, and reproductive force in a given landscape to a seemingly catastrophic “blow down”.  A qualitative difference, as seen in the differing effects, and in spite of the difficulty in precisely demarcating it, nonetheless exists.  The same force, be it wind, fire, or water, can range in effect from positive acclimation to extinction, depending on the intensity of the force, its frequency, and the co-evolutionary history of force and organism (Sousa 1984).  Indeed, it has been observed that some species depend on the severest manifestation of a given perturbation to complete their life cycles and propagate their species (Vogl 1977).  It might therefore be concluded that what is a perturbation for some species might actually create the physical environment necessary for the very existence of others.  At a sufficient scale or perspective, all disturbance may ultimately be incorporated in the same manner that all systems and feedback loops are ultimately contained and accommodated.  The label “disturbance”, at least as commonly connoted, can therefore be misleading.
 By taking an hierarchical approach to landscape and perturbation scales, landscape ecology seeks to obtain some perspective.  Landscape ecology emerged in the last quarter of the twentieth century as an holistic approach toward understanding landscape patterns, perturbation, and scale (Urban, O’Neill and Shugart 1987).
 Perturbation, biotic processes, and environmental constraints interact over temporal and physical scales to generate a mosaic of landscape patches and patterns.  As examples of increasing scales, perturbation in the ponderosa ecosystem can range from individual tree fall, to blow-down, to insect predation, to fire, and to climate change.  Environmental constraints can range from light/shade, to hydrology, to topography/slope, and to climate change.
 These scales themselves form a hierarchical network, similar to what was discussed in systems theory and succession, tending toward convergence or climax, metaphorically speaking, at higher systems levels.  This network can be illuminated through the concept of incorporation, by considering whether a focal area is sufficient in scale to incorporate a given perturbation without disruption of homeostasis (Figure 1).
 

FIGURE 1
SIMPLIFIED REPRESENTATION OF
SCALES OF INCORPORATION

 I have modified the figure and model in several ways from that of the source material.  Instead of an enclosed box implying finiteness, I have substituted open-ended arrows in both the large and small ranges.  On the very large scale, there is the implication that there exists a landscape of sufficient scope to incorporate all but the most infinite of perturbation, perhaps on the scale of singularity or theology.  This may be landscape ecology’s metaphor for the systems theory notion that positive feedback loops are eventually contained within a higher level negative, or limiting, feedback loop.
 I left the very small scales unenclosed to represent the vastness of the micro world and our relative lack of understanding and appreciation for this scale.  For instance, it has been estimated that approximately 95% of the biomass contained in the Earth’s oceans is micro organismic in nature (Woese 1990).  From recent genetic studies conducted for the purpose of constructing a relational model of life on Earth, a “Tree of Life”, essentially all of what has been historically included in successional processes could be placed on one “branch”, with the remainder of the “tree” consisting primarily of micro-organismic forms (Woese 1990).  It is certainly possible that succession, to the extent that it is valid at larger scales, also operates at the microscopic level.  If we extend the notion of open systems, as well as other macro-successional mechanisms to this realm, it is also possible that micro succession has a significant impact on macro processes.  Soil ecology and micro ecology are areas currently emerging as important fields of study.

 In addition to addressing scale from the physical standpoint, it must also be examined from the temporal.  Bode’s Law may serve as a metaphor.
  Although attributed to J. E. Bode, the concept known as Bode’s Law was discovered by Johann Titius in 1766 and subsequently formulated as a mathematical expression by Bode in 1778.  Starting with the numbers 0 and 3, doubling the 3 and all numbers thereafter, and then adding 4 to each, results in the sequence 4, 7, 10, 16, 28, 52, 100, 196, 388, 772 which, when divided by 10, corresponds to the relative distances of the planets from the sun, as well as many moons from their planets.  Our understanding of the asteroid belt was enhanced when this concept was applied to the perceived gap in the solar system where the Law indicated there should be none.  Is it possible that there is a similar temporal sequence regarding successional shifts/punctuations?
 This assumes some importance when we consider the anthropocentric perspective in which succession has been viewed.  Humans like to pride themselves in being able to view systems from an outside, aloof perspective.  But this sort of “outside the box’ thinking is very difficult and rare.  For example, the population oscillations detailed in classic studies of predator-prey relationships, such as bobcat-rabbit models, take place at a temporal scale which bears a relationship to the life spans of the two animals, and as such may be beyond their ability to incorporate behaviorally.  Similarly, the oscillations in factors which affect human population may be occurring at scales beyond our current ability to fully comprehend and incorporate into our thinking and planning.
 Transferring this notion to successional theory, it is possible that much of what has been contributed to the field has suffered from a limited perspective.  Fortunately, recent research has sought to address succession from larger temporal scales.  It is now increasingly accepted, but still under-appreciated, that ecosystems change over time beyond what succession alone can account for (Millar n.p.).  Foremost among these long-term factors are evolution and climate change.
 Climate is now generally seen as a major factor, co-evolving with ecosystems.  In addition to traditional successional processes, climate change influences, through natural selection and life-history strategies, the evolution of ecosystem components.  In turn, by such processes as hydrological cycles, biogenic acid rain and light reflectance/absorption or albedo effects, ecosystems are part of the same complex feedback loop.  These climate changes are often considered along annual, decadal, centennial, and millennial time scales, sometimes expressed exponentially as 10⁰, 10¹, 10², and 10³, respectively.
 This recent expansion of temporal perspective has given rise to new hypotheses on succession and climax.  As one example, it has been postulated (Katz 1926; Klinger 1990) that peatland bogs may, under certain circumstances, represent the true climax community succeeding mature forest, one that remains stable over temporal scales approaching the glacial.
 It would be interesting to compare the attributes of the peatland ecosystem to those of the mature successional stage as delineated by Odum.  I have suggested this to Lee Klinger.  On the surface, the successional pattern of increasing height would appear to be broken.  Biomass and diversity, however, the latter on the micro scale, appear to follow the traditional tendencies.

 In conclusion, there appears, on one hand, to have been a gradual evolution in our understanding of ecological successional processes.  At the same time, there appears to have been some substantial realignment of basic notions, sufficient perhaps to represent a paradigm shift.
 Among these changed notions, foremost to the field may be the realization that all ecosystems are open systems, subject to influence from other systems and forces.  This is true on all scales and at all systems levels, from the quantum to the universal.  Another shift from classical opinion is the appreciation of disturbance or perturbation as an integral force of succession and evolution, rather than an exceptional interference (Pickett and Ostfeld 1995).
 The most profound shift may lie in the realization that we are embedded in that which we seek to observe and isolate.  It now appears that the majority of the ecosystems we previously held as “natural” or “undisturbed” have been significantly affected by the presence of, and interaction with, humans.  We are not exempt from the process of co-evolution.  The interaction of indigenous Peoples with their local environments is now seen as an essential component of ecology.  In many cases, Native Peoples’ responses to climate change had as significant an effect on ecosystems as the climate change itself (Alcoze 1993).
 Lest a Eurocentric bias still lead technological humanity to consider itself outside these processes, we need only look to our managed forests for examples.  My ponderosa forest parcel which I viewed as “natural” and for which I felt “letting Nature take its course” would be the most appropriate management policy, had undergone extensive logging and reseeding over the past century.  More recently, it has been subjected to fire suppression and pattern isolation as a result of development and road building.  In short, this ecosystem has co-evolved with humans in such a way that its existence and health would now be optimized by human-initiated thinning and litter removal, mimicking the affects of fire.
 At the same time, I have been changed by this ecosystem as well.  The wood I remove from the dead trees I thin helps heat my house and cook my food.  The woods, the work I do, and the time I spend in them, have had a reciprocal effect on me as well, affecting my character and personality.
 These concepts represent the present in ecological and successional thinking.  The future will perhaps hold a greater understanding of the roles of micro organisms and micro processes on ecology.  Soil ecology, an increased appreciation for stochastic or chance behavior, and even chaos theory are assuming greater prominence in the field.

FREE WILL

Literature Review

 In the classical treatises on philosophy, it was common to utilize the form of a dialogue between the author and another character.  As I reviewed the material on free will, I found myself interrupting the positions of these great thinkers with thoughts, questions, and comments of my own.  I have therefore employed a form similar to the classical, interrupting my review of the philosophic literature with first person commentary.  Hopefully, the reader will find this style interesting and productive.
 Like succession, the dialogue concerning free will had separated itself into two advocacy camps in the Western tradition.  On one side, there were those who believed in the concept of Determinism.  This view can be summarized by the following simplified, logical construct:

 -To have free will, we must be independent of the causal order.
 -But we are part of the causal order.
 -Therefore we do not have free will.

 On the other side were those who believed in free will, traditionally known as Libertarians.  While there has been much development of the deterministic viewpoint, with volumes of seemingly tightly-reasoned discourse devoted to it, the Libertarian position had largely been argued in the negative.  Rather than offering a positive proof of free will, its adherents concluded that such a proof was elusive and assumed the task of disputing the certainty of Determinism.
 More recently, perhaps sensing that a total victory of the free will argument was a windmill not worth tilting at, Libertarian authors seem to have acknowledged that at least a portion of human action and decision is causally dependent.  This has led to a discussion concerning whether or not Determinism and Libertarianism can coexist and co-operate.  The two sides in this subsequent debate have been labeled “compatibilist” and “incompatibilist”.
 All these viewpoints must address the question of what constitutes a decision or choice, and how a decision is made.  It is generally agreed that all true choice involves deliberation, and between deliberation and action may be what has been called “volition”, or the will to act.  As Sidney Morgenbesser and James Walsh state in Free Will, “The full concept of a decision then, would be that of a mental conclusion to deliberation which sets off a volition which in turn sets off an appropriate movement of the body” (Morgenbesser and Walsh 1962).
 But do we truly deliberate, or deliberate freely, if everything has a cause or a determinant?  Is the process of deliberation itself causally directed, or is this process somehow independent, as some seem to have presumed?
 Another thread which has run continuously through the free will dialogue concerns the questions of responsibility and morality.  If citizens are to be held responsible only for actions arising out of the exercise of their free will, and if ultimately, all actions are externally caused, does this mean that we are not fully responsible for our acts, that our actions are not fully within our control?  Furthermore, does the distinction between moral and immoral then disappear, to be relegated to defining only effects and not intents?  Some have attempted to delineate a clear distinction between voluntary and involuntary acts, such as sneezing, utilizing the criterion of whether one could have acted otherwise, to hold only the voluntary responsible.
 Even the sneeze may not be perfectly involuntary.  On one level the conditions leading to the sneeze, such as general wellness, social contacts, and preventative nose blowing, are voluntary and contain an element of causality.  On another level, the biological mechanisms are also causally deterministic, but less voluntary.  Perhaps a distinction between the voluntary and the involuntary only exists on one narrowly defined systems level, that of volition, if even then.
  Some have attempted to qualify free will by invoking “necessary conditions” for its exercise.  An individual cannot fly even if s/he wants to, or solve quantum equations simply by willing the ability.  The successful exercise of free will, therefore, would logically depend upon the existence of necessary preconditions.  Others have disputed this notion, saying that choices, be they evolutionary or educational, were still made, albeit on a more distant, abstract level, causally limiting action.  Still others say this entire argument is meaningless and too mechanically literal.  It is not so much the ability to successfully complete or achieve the objective of one’s volition, as it is the volition itself, which defines free will.
 Every event may have a cause, but different events can perhaps arise from the same cause.  Events can clarify causes, acting atemporally in a quantum sense, even “occurring” before causes.  An electron bounced off a target keeps its location options open until after it has beenobserved (Davies 1983).
 With the above as background, what proceeds is an historical overview of the evolution of the classical free will dialogue.

 In the Western tradition, the historical thread concerning free will begins with the contributions of the classical thinkers, Plato and Aristotle.  Before the Christian era, the dialogue was of a different character, and arose out of different motivations, than would be the case after the advent of Christianity.  Both Plato and Aristotle were concerned with the question of what was voluntary and what was not.  The importance of this was neither theological nor teleological.  Instead of being concerned with the questions to come concerning the point at which Man/Woman begins and God ends, or those of causality and first causes, the classical thinkers were concerned with esthetics and the seemingly more mundane issues of ethics, civics, and responsibility.  For which actions should an individual be held accountable, just the voluntary or both the voluntary and involuntary?  If the former, where was the line between voluntary and involuntary action?
 While many have since tried to postulate theories and rationales for quantifying this line of demarcation between the voluntary and the involuntary, Plato arrived at the conclusion that the quest for clear and practical definitions was fruitless (Morgenbesser and Walsh 1962).
 Plato’s deliberations took place within the larger context of the debate over legal responsibility.  His pupil, Aristotle, took the debate to a further level, by considering Plato’s conclusion in the negative.  What was sufficient for culpable or blamable ignorance?  He concluded that “...all that has been deliberately chosen is voluntary, but not all the voluntary is deliberately chosen,...”.  While also unable to provide precise definitions, he judged the attempts of legislators to delineate between voluntary, involuntary, and premeditated mental states and actions to be reasonable, for “at least they approximate the truth”.
 A careful reading of Aristotle’s “Ethica Eudemia” (Book II, Chapters vi-x) reveals his attention to notions which would later become subjects in themselves, such as apparent, individual, or short-term good versus long-term, common, or universal good, as well as the intervening state between desire and action, which Aristotle approaches as “opinion and desire together” and which would later be called volition.
 In the aftermath of the ascension of Christianity, the dialogue was reshaped by the conflict between official desire to attribute all aspects of existence to the will of God, and the need to hold Man/Woman responsible for hir (his/her) “sins”, and thereby necessitate a controlling church hierarchy.  For if all actions were the result of God’s will, how could there be sin, punishment, retribution, good or evil?
 Perhaps the inclusion of God into the dialogue over free will exacerbated the notion of a distinction between humans and other beings.  The conception of will as being a quality imparted from God to Man/Woman may have served to reinforce the belief that only humans were capable of morality, reasoning and deliberation.  This could be considered the beginning of a formal anthropocentric view on the subject and probably served and still serves to limit understanding in the field.
 The early Christian scholars sought to incorporate the classical notions of the voluntary and the involuntary in considering the relationship between God’s will and what was becoming known as Man’s (sic) will or free will.
 Both St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas saw free will in the context of God and emanating from God.  They both shared the view that the only proper moral direction of will was toward the service of God.  But they differed somewhat in their views of will’s deterministic aspects.
 St. Augustine’s writings appeared to reflect a shift from a position of strict free will, albeit a conditional one, to one of theological determinism.  He did so by making a distinction between natural, inherent free will, and the freedom to consent to God’s will.  It is the latter that was lost with original sin, but is reobtainable.  Augustine appeared to be saying that consent is always possible, but within a God-determined universe.  God almost paradoxically makes free will possible in a deterministic sense.  Augustine spoke of the different levels of compulsion that an individual might be subjected to, and how compulsion in itself might not disprove free will, but rather act as a determinant of action or inaction.
 Aquinas responded to Augustine’s assertion that what is compulsory may not be voluntary by saying that Man has free will to act, but only in response to complying with teleological necessity.  Aquinas appeared to be seeking some sort of middle ground where both free will and determinism have meaning.  God is the First Mover and the First Cause in a deterministic sense, but people have the ability to consent to God’s will.
 Must free will only exist in purposeless and unaffected acts and decisions?  Can we have free will even if we never use or manifest it?  Does Determinism depend on a degree of linearity, with non-linear behavior suggesting a degree of choice and free will?  Do we choose not to act because of societal and cultural dictates?  What of mood and environmental conditions, the larger Mind?
 The arguments of the classical thinkers failed to incorporate different levels of causality, as well as degrees, continuums, and distinctions between quality and quantity.  The early Christian philosophers saw additional levels in the debate, and postulated the teleological notion of first cause, albeit in the theological sense.  They attempted to reconcile the appearance of free will withthe supremacy of God’s will by asserting that God sees all possibilities but grants Man/Woman free will.  Could this be paraphrased to say that granting free will does not ultimately affect Fate on a higher level?
 Is there a choice to have free will?  Is pure free will ultimately the state of having infinite choice?  If so, do we approach free will by seeking perfect information?
 John Stuart Mills in 1867 was considered a Determinist, although he allowed for a certain exercise of the will in matters of character.  He made a distinction between the prevailing fatalistic viewpoint, espoused by what were called the Necessitarians, and his modified cause and effect approach.  While natural desires and actions may follow a deterministic course, Mills claimed that the nature of one’s character was within one’s power to affect and therefore was a valid object of societal attention. As such, a measure of free will was appropriate in that it conferred responsibility.
 The flip of one coin may produce a non-deterministic result of either heads or tails.  But is free will a quality of the result of an action, or of the deliberation before?  In addition, is the determinism in a coin toss merely occurring on a different level?  Might what has come to be considered chance or stochastic processes in succession actually be unseen allogenic and autogenic processes?
 Philippa Foot in 1957 quoted A. J. Ayer in asserting that, “from the fact that my action is causally determined...it does not necessarily follow that I am not free”.  She then concluded that rather than being incompatible, free will requires determinism.  Either an action is the result of chance or it is the causal result of a decision, the exercise of free will.  Free will, according to Foot, is determined, as opposed to random, choice.
 It is interesting to note that the use of x’s and y’s, A’s and B’s, began to appear with Foot and others of this era, as a means of attaching mathematical and logical authority to one’s position.  At about the same time, Lindeman and others were beginning to attempt mathematical quantification of successional processes.
 Roderick M. Chisolm in 1964 made the distinction between event-causation and agent-causation in an attempt to prove Libertarianism.  To do so required a proof of true accidents, as well as agent-causation itself uncaused to that point.  He concluded that such a proof was unattainable.
 As mentioned earlier, true accidents may be an illusion, simply events whose causes are hidden.  In a sense, agent-causation is a circular way to establish the Libertarian position by postulating a categorical exception to Determinism.
 Are all these attempts to prove or disprove free will overly linear?  What of emergents and systems?  Interestingly, RenéDescartes, the champion of discursive reasoning, was a Libertarian.  One might have thought that he would have supported a mechanistic, deterministic view.  The answer may
lie in his view of the mind of Man (sic) as being the primary certainty, withall else lyingoutside that sphere.  By postulating a closed system for consciousness, and separating it from the deterministic universe, he could comfortably assert absolute free will.
 Can determinism be disproved by these linear arguments?  Some have attempted to use values, purpose and rational choice to create a teleological framework for Libertarianism, but it appears that the determinism has simply been reconfigured.
 In modern times, the argument for compatibility has taken a different tack.  Instead of focusing on some sort of proof for the existence of free will or by postulating conditions and causal agents, advocates restate the question in these terms: Is there anything in a deterministic universe which would necessarily preclude the existence of free will?
 Compatibilists feel that the legitimacy of this postulate is evident when one considers the very real distinctions between certain types of behaviors.  For instance, a thief who chooses to steal exhibits a different quality of choice than a compulsive kleptomaniac.  Incompatibilists, however, might argue that the causality is merely on a different level.
   But is that different level, that of conscious deliberation and volition, sufficiently transcendent to be considered of a different, non-deterministic quality?  Determinism need not be puppet-like.  But the causations may be so infinite and subtle, representing a multi-directional continuum of effects, as to render the question almost irrelevant.
 Choice may be viewed as natural forces, events, desires and impulses deliberated upon by the inner self, itself determined by nurture, biography, biology, disposition, etc.  While Libertarians distinguish between the rational self and the impulsive self to establish a foundation for responsibility, Determinists insist on the persistence of causal explanations for both selves.  Could free will exist in the interface of the two selves?
 Free will can not be proven by linear, Cartesian means, only by considering it an emergent property transcending its deterministic parts.  In Eastern traditions where first causes and spiritual sources are internal rather than external, causal hierarchies tending toward the universal may tend toward the individual consciousness.  If we equate free will with the attainment of the universal, perhaps the pathway lies within.
 Finally, on the question of our species’ proprietary hold on free will, I can only wonder about others, such as dogs.  I often see my dog “deliberate” over such decisions as whether to obey my “stay” requests or whether to pursue the squirrel from the upstairs or the downstairs window.  I do not believe there is
more than a quantitative difference in the nature of her will and mine, if that.
 And why even limit this quality to mammals?  Who is to say that the individual heart cell does not have free will, choosing to beat in its own singular manner?  Each person can deliberate.  While those deliberations may define the self, do our collective deliberations assume a character and tendencies unique to the community, the ecosystem, or the species?  Does the assemblage have free will if both heart cells and human communities tend toward convergence at larger numbers and higher levels, or does free will diminish until chaos or perturbation intervenes?
 As Gary Watson says in his book Free Will, “...the problem of free will is part of the problem of finding room in the world for ourselves” (Watson 1982).

 An adjunct to the topic of free will, one that also has relevance to ecological succession, is self-interest.  In human systems, self-interest had traditionally (in the Western tradition) been relegated to encompass only that which was not other-regarding.  This latter regard had been assigned to the field of morality.  A corollary to this construct was the conception of rationality as pertaining only to self-regarding self-interest, conveying a degree of irrationality to other-regard (Paul, Miller, Jr. and Paul 1997).  In other words, self-interest was exclusively self-regarding and rational, while morality was exclusively other-regarding and irrational.
 The benefits of morality, or virtue as it had often been characterized, were debated in the time of the Western classical thinkers, for the same reasons that free will was contemplated, that is, for its relevance to ethics and civic responsibility (Rogers 1997).
 In more recent times, the view of virtue and morality as being limited to other-regard has been challenged by philosophers, some of whom go so far as to define morality as self-interest taken to its ultimate level.
   Some of this debate is semantic.  For instance, what an individual sees as fulfilling hir self-interest may not be perceived as such from the perspective of another or from a societal standpoint.  Do we define self-interest subjectively or objectively?  Aspects of the dialogue, however, are reducible to literal questions of self-regard versus other-regard, and the conflicts that can arise between these two motivations.
 That self-regard and self-interest are valid human qualities is axiomatic, if only from the biological standpoint.  All beings have foundational needs that include sustenance, water and other environmental necessities, according to their life histories.  Expanding on the biological is the concept of psychological self-interest or "psychological egoism", which sees total self-regard in all acts, even charity.  Others argue against this, viewing altruism as a valid and distinct, other-regarding quality.
 We can see emerging in this discussion, at least metaphorically, elements of the previous discussion on Determinism/Libertarianism.  We might well presume that the determinist view of self-interest would support the biological and psychological egoism position, while the Libertarian might champion, again without offering a positive “proof”, an emergent altruistic quality.  The Determinist in effect may claim that self-interest still deterministically informs altruism, but by less obvious means.
 There are also aspects of the compatibilist-incompatibilist debate.  Compatibilists might accept a measure of other-regard as self-regarding.  Beyond parent/child relationships, circles of friends, and relatives, the extent may be variable.  The degree of self-regard, and not simply the quality, may itself be deterministic in character.  As in the free will debate, however, compatibilists might argue that the prevalence of self-interest does not preclude the existence of true altruism.
 What follows is a brief overview of some of the major Western contributions to the philosophical dialogue on self-interest.

 The Sophists, in the fifth century B.C.E., argued a base form of self-interest, specifically, doing whatever one wanted.  In this view, government was simply a contrivance of the weak, their exercise of self-interest in limiting the strong.  Socrates, a contemporary of the Sophists, rejected the separation of rationality and virtue.  Instead, he pointed to the fact that beings can not survive in opposition to their nature.  Therefore, since both rationality/self-interest and virtue were human qualities, both must be essential for fulfillment.  Plato further weighted this notion, favoring the interests of society over the interests of the individual.  His student Aristotle asserted that, while the pursuit of one’s own material benefit is important, it is more specifically and ultimately virtue and a fulfilled soul that are the essences of happiness.
 In the third and fourth century B.C.E., Epicurus and his followers associated self-interest solely with pleasure.  While this may seem identical to the Sophist argument, Epicureans expanded the notion of pleasure to encompass less episodic and more longer-term pleasures, such as those that might derive from the development of the soul, and virtue.  To their thinking, for example, while the motivation for friendship may start as self-interest, maximum pleasure can only be attained when the other is appreciated intrinsically.
 The Stoics believed that the Universe was entirely deterministic and teleological, with the exception of the soul, so everything proceeded according and toward its own nature.  Believing that virtue was a person’s true nature, it logically followed that virtue was the highest order of self-interest to which one could aspire.
 With the advent of Christianity, virtue was redefined toward the service of God.  St. Augustine viewed government and fellowship as God-given instruments to curb the human proclivity toward self-serving behavior.  Since earthly life represented merely a fleeting event, one of less importance than the eternal life to come, true self-interest lay in serving God through virtue, and not in mortal gain.  Thus Augustine’s perception reversed the traditional notions of self-interest and altruism.
 While Augustine seemed to disagree with Aristotelian views of earthly happiness and harmony as the ultimate virtues, St. Thomas Aquinas attempted to reconcile Aristotle’s philosophy with Christianity.  He did this by equating ultimate happiness with God, thereby aligning Aristotle’s soul development and happiness pursuits with Christian ideals.  To Aquinas, the pursuit of earthly happiness was not in itself incompatible with eternal pursuits, but rather had the potential to enhance one’s virtue.
 Baruch Spinoza, a seventeenth century philosopher, believed that the universe was essentially deterministic and that we therefore possessed no free will in the traditional sense.  He maintained, however, that there existed a way out of this causal prison by means of pursuing a true or accurate view of reality.  He seemed to be foreshadowing an almost Batesonian view of enlightenment, postulating the attainment of an “outside the box” perspective as necessary for free will.
 Spinoza viewed it as natural that every individual should seek self-preservation and self-interest.  He viewed the ultimate self-interest to be in seeking that freedom of mind described above, through true knowledge of the universe.  Since God was the ultimate object in the universe, seeking knowledge of God was the ultimate expression of self-interest.  By this reasoning, Spinoza equated self-interest and virtue.
 Spinoza concluded that through an assemblage of individuals, each seeking hir own advantage, the greatest good would come to a community or society.  In this there are fore-echoes of Sahtouris’ statement concerning the optimization of an ecosystem through the maximizing strategies of its component species.  Spinoza’s philosophy also translates well to Eastern traditions, where ultimate freedom is gained through the innerwork that seeks connection with one’s true spiritual center.
 Bernard Mandeville followed Spinoza and affirmed some of those thoughts equating self-interest with virtue, but perhaps only to the extent of the mundane.  He speculated that a completely altruistic society would stagnate and eventually decay in the absence of self-interest.  It is only through achievement, progress, and self-fulfillment that desires continue to evolve, sustaining human drive and will.  In this there is a parallel to the natural rationale for succession, in that both Mandeville’s self-interest and succession facilitate the dynamic of creativity, diversity, resilience, and stability.
 Adam Smith, the eighteenth century thinker who is best remembered as an economist, contributed much to this area of philosophy.  It is no coincidence that what, in the self-interest dialogue, is seen as accruing to the “good” of the individual is also called a “good” or “goods” in economic theory.  Smith, too, made the case for the optimization of society through the collective maximization of self-interests.  This was somewhat qualified by the notion of cooperation in the marketplace.  The buyer and seller enter into an agreement because they each view the deal as advantageous and beneficial to each of their self-interests.
 As in ecological theory, competition is ultimately seen as cooperation on a different or higher level.  Smith saw benevolence and virtue as inherent in human nature and as qualities that will naturally manifest in the perfect marketplace.  It is as if an “invisible hand” enters the commercial arena and directs affairs toward the common good.
 John Stuart Mill and the other Utilitarians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries debated the proportional influences of self-regard and other-regard on behavior.  It was agreed that complete other-regard would be fatal to both the individual and society.  The debate, therefore, centered on the extent to which other-regard could intrude upon self-interest.
 Friedrich Nietzsche answered the Utilitarian question in the extreme.  The only true self-interest was self-regard.  Not content to merely extol the worth of the individual, he asserted that altruism reflected a weakness of the ego, and that both government and religion were expressions of the egoism of the weak.  In this way, Nietzsche brought Christianity into the Sophist philosophical construct.
 Beginning with the psychologist William James and continuing into the twentieth century, the self-interest debate began to focus on questions of self and ego.  John Dewey saw the self not as an isolated and fully-formed subject, but as an object continually defined by behavior and actions.  Thus, acts of altruism were not somehow distinct from self-interest, but were instrumental in defining the self.  Here, one can see elements of both mutual causality and the concept of open systems and feedback loops.
 It followed from James’ and Dewey's philosophy that social aspects, such as charity and culture, were legitimate manifestations of self-interest, as they were themselves influencers and determinants of the self.
 If James seemed to take up the Aristotelian mantle, Ayn Rand appeared to champion and modernize the views of the Sophists and Nietzsche.  Rand rejected the influence of biology and impulse on human behavior, claiming instead that we are ultimately volitional creatures of reason.  Morality, therefore, should be based solely upon that which an individual’s reason indicates will lead to happiness and fulfillment (Rand 1964).
 She saw altruistic other-regard as incompatible with and negating of self-regard, and therefore immoral in her construct.  Stranger-regard was considered irrational, immoral and demeaning to the stranger.  Helping a loved one, however, was seen as a manifestation of one’s personal values.  Implied in Rand’s philosophy was the notion that the collective good is best served by maximizing the individual good.
 In his 1997 essay, “Self-Interest, Altruism and Virtue” (Paul, Miller, Jr. and Paul 1997), Thomas Hurka sought to consolidate different camps of the debate by first defining such qualities as pleasure, freedom from pain, knowledge, and success as intrinsically good, whether manifested in one’s self or in another.  Morality, then, is expressed through seeking these intrinsic goods wherever the potential exists.  Distinctions between self-interest and altruism become somewhat meaningless in this sense, as it is the intrinsic good that is valued, and not its receptacle.  Irrationality and immorality arise not out of the absoluteness of the self or the other in regarding, but in unhealthy imbalances between the two preferences.

 Even after all the philosophical exercises, and regardless of whether we employ such terms as egoism, virtue, or rationality, it appears that we tend to gravitate back toward traditional views of altruism and self-interest.  We still almost instinctively or intuitively perceive a moral difference between behavior which is self-regarding and that which is other-regarding.  Perhaps some societal or moral guilt is involved in preserving this distinction.  Perhaps the ambiguity in deciding what is truly in our best interest draws us to the apparent security of more concrete, other-regarding moral codes.  We often do not know what we want, so it is easier to define our wants in relation to a societal template.  Altruism, morality, and virtue, as defined by our culture, inform this template.  In a culture based upon self-fulfillment, for example, self-regard becomes more acceptable and congruous with virtue.

Perspectives from Other Wisdom Traditions

 While this thesis does not specifically incorporate the three traditions that are too briefly touched upon in this section, they represent seeds of wisdom that may greatly assist in nurturing understanding of the themes.  As I have carried these aspects with me throughout this work, I wished to share the same influences with the reader.  From Tales of Reb Zalman (Schwarz and Schachter-Shalomi 1989), here then is “a story that escaped from the Dream Assembly”:

 One day Reb Sholem came to see Reb Zalman.  He had just been thinking about the problem of Divine Providence, and freedom of choice, and each time it looked to him that there was no way in which any human being could solve this conundrum.  If there is such a thing as Divine Providence how could there be freedom of choice, and if there is the freedom of choice, then there is no such thing as Divine Providence?
 This doesn't give him any peace.  So Reb Zalman said to Reb Sholem, "Go and bring me Wojtek.  The ethnik, the ferry man"...
 So they went and traveled and came to the river.  And at the river they were sitting in a boat and Wojtek asked them, "Can you swim?"  And they looked at Reb Zalman, saying," Can we really swim?"  Reb Zalman said to them, "Can you swim across the ocean?" and they said, "No."  And then he said, "Could you swim across the sea?" They said, "No."  "Could you swim across a lake?"  They said "No."  "Could you swim across a pond?"  And they said, "Efshar, maybe."  So he says, "O.K.  Let's go...
 They ask Wojtek if he would take the boat down a small waterfall.  Wojtek looks at them and says, "Are you God-forsaken, are you crazy?  There's nothing that can save me.  It's not a big waterfall but the boat will break and I'll break every bone in my body.  I refuse to do this.  I'm not going over that waterfall.  The waterfall is surely the place where one can destroy himself."
 Whereupon he looks at Reb Sholem and asks whether he wants to go.  "No, no, no!  For me the calm water was all that I could handle.  I don't even want to go back on the white water, never mind the waterfall!"...
 Next shabbos they're sitting at S'udah sh'lishit and they're singing the psalm, "The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want, he leads my beside the still waters".  Reb Zalman in the middle of that nice contemplative song, bangs on the table, and says - “I want to interrupt you right now for a moment and sing that song from Yom Kippur night that goes, ‘we are like clay in the potter's hand, in the hand of the potter’.”

KI HINEH KAHOMER

We are as clay in potter's hand
He does contract, He does expand
So we are yours to shape at will
We yield to you--
Our passions still.

Like mason shaping rough-hewn stone
We are Your stuff in flesh and bone
You deal with us in death, in life
We yield to you--
please heal our strife.

The smith can shape a blade of steel
Shape the edge and bend the heel
So in life's furnace you temper us
We yield to You--
surrender us.

(When they come to the verse:)
A boat is steered by helmsman's might
He turns to left, he turns to right
As long as You keep straight our keel
We yield to You-
please make us feel.

 He turns to Reb Sholem and says,  "‘He leads me beside the still waters’ --  and on the rough waters.  At which point do I have a choice, and at which point is everything preordained?”
 Reb Sholems's eyes light up and he gets very excited, and turning to the Hasidim around the table he says, "I know, I know, I know why you did it!  Now I know!"
 Reb Zalman asks him, "What is it that you know?"
 So he says, "...some people think that the freedom of choice they have is like the still waters and in the still waters whichever way I want to row -- to the right or to the left-- I row.  But as it says in the Yom Kippur liturgy, "‘We are like the rudder in the hand of the sailor, whichever way he wants to, he turns to the right, he turns to the left.’”
 When they finished singing, Reb Zalman asks him again, "Now sing that stanza again,...”
 They sing it again, "and as long as you keep straight our keel, we yield to You - please make us feel"
 Reb Zalman says to Reb Sholem, "Now go through that whole experience.  What is it that you know?  What is it that you see?"
 Reb Sholem lights up now because he understands perfectly that the philosophers are arguing that God is doing divine providence of everything -- they're talking about the waterfall.  When God takes you, there's nothing you can do.  On the waterfall you can't steer, but on the plain lake, on the pond where the water is calm, there you can steer in every direction where you wish to go.  But most of life is made up like that Bialtchik river where they were doing the white water traveling, which is to say, there is a stream which goes down from the high place to the low place but it leaves some room for you to do some steering.
 David Hamelekh, King David is saying, “He leads me beside the still waters,” and he gives me the greatest amount of free choice.  But, gam ki elech b'gey tsalmoves--“yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,” which is like a waterfall, “I fear no evil, for Thou art with me”.  Because who makes the waterfall in the first place?  It's You who got me in the waterfall in the first place, it's You.
 And finally the holy Izhbitzer, Reb Mord'chai Yossef teaches: "When everything will be over, in the end, and we look back, we will realize that everything was divine providence, even our choices were decreed.”
 “So why is it that we experience?” says Reb Chayyim Elyah; "Why is it that we then experience such trouble, such travail, such work, and the choices that we then have to make?"
 Reb Zalman says, "That too the holy Izhbitzer says, God so loves us that even though he decrees everything that is to happen to us, He gives us the subjective experience.  As this leads us, our work has done it because this is what gives meaning to our lives.  This is the way in which He can invite us into partnership; not that we can do it by ourselves, or not that we can really do it at all, but the drama that God sets up is the drama of our choice."

(Source: Schwarz, Howard. The Dream Assembly: Tales of Reb Zalman. Nevada City, CA: Gateways Books & Tapes, 1989.  Used and excerpted with permission.)

 Before the time of the Buddha in India, there were four main schools of thought concerning causality and determinism.  They were generally differentiated by seeing events as being other-caused (deterministic), self-caused (inherent properties), both or neither (Macy 1991).
 The Buddha sought to clearly reject the linear aspects of determinism.  Many factors operated on past acts and events, producing an infinite variety of possible resultant consequences.  Among these many factors were chance, accidents, mood, and karma, or deeds.
 To illustrate by way of parable, it is observed that two identical seeds, when planted in different soils, will produce distinctly different flowers.  Another story is told of how the same measure of salt, while making a glass of water undrinkable, might not have the same affect when added to the river Ganges (Macy 1991).  In other words, influencing factors can sufficiently modify linear causation as to make determinism moot.
 The attempt is not to fully reject determinism in Buddhism, but to replace it with a type of soft determinism.  It is said that karma does not prescribe an absolute fate, but rather a tendency which can be modified, reversed or expanded upon.  It follows from this that the exercise of the will is not absolutely deterministic in nature, but rather reflects causal influences in its tendencies.
 The Buddha regarded manifested decisions as reflecting voluntary choice.  It is the will to act, volition or cetana, which is itself the determinant of past effects in that it gives clarity, meaning, purpose, and definition to those past effects.  In this there is an element of the same atemporal or quantum effect noted earlier in the discussion of systems theory.
 The word cetana comes closest in the Buddhist tradition to defining will or volition.  However, there are opposing opinions on this subject.  Herbert Guenther defines cetana more as “stimulus, motive or drive” (Guenther 1976).  It is as if a manager or general, by organizing and preparing resources, begins a process leading to action.  Volition, on the other hand, implies the direct action of will.  To Guenther’s thinking, this direct-indirect variance indicates that cetana and volition are more antonyms than synonyms.  In his conception of cetana, we find elements of the agent-causation theories of some of the Western free will philosophers.

 It is difficult to determine the conception of free will in Native American traditions.  The notion itself does not translate well, and may be of limited meaning and utility.  However, there are ways and concepts in these traditions which may inform on the subject of free will.  I have received permission from Dik Darnell of the Lakota to relate some of his thoughts on this.
 In his tradition there exists a Star of Destiny for each individual.  It is this sign that sets out the true course that an individual should follow to be of most help to hir People.  Through prayer and ritual, indications of one’s life purpose are revealed.  It remains for the person to align his or her work and actions with this purpose, in order to follow hir true path.  It should be noted, however, that the revealing of an individual’s path does not signify a Western-style quality of individualism in this tradition.  Rather, purpose is directed in service toward, and reflects an embeddedness within, the People as a whole.
 This indirect approach to the concept of free will in Native American traditions derives from the notion of the self.  Vine Deloria, Jr., a Sioux elder and author, points out that the realities of a traditional, indigenous lifestyle, with its immediacy and interdependency of the group, lead to a deemphasizing of the individual self.  Individualistic notions are therefore not only unrealistic, but conceivably terrifying in this context and in this particular tradition (Deloria 1973).  Deloria quotes Harvey Cox, a Protestant theologian and author, in saying, “He does not so much live in a tribe; the tribe lives in him” (Cox 1965).
 Enveloping much tribal and individual activities concerning self, choice and purpose is the field of prophecy.  Prophecy is reflected in many activities, including ritual and foretelling.  Many Native traditions speak of different stages of the world.  In this conception, we move through different ages, renewals or rebirths, each distinctly different and without the “baggage” of the prior.  And yet the prior World informs and prepares the one to come.  Here there is a sense of both emergence and causality.

Two Fictional Perspectives on Free Will

 Isaac Asimov’s Foundation trilogy is a science-fiction epic based on the concept of “psychohistory” (Asimov 1951, 1952, 1953).  Psychohistory postulates that, collectively, human behavior is sufficiently deterministic to allow for accurate historical extrapolation.  These predictions can only be reliable in the macro sense.  Individual futures and the very short-term course of events are more stochastic in nature and, in this, foretelling psychohistory is analogous to accurately forecasting long-term climate change while next week’s local weather remains a mystery.
 Asimov’s protagonist Hari Seldon, the man who perfects psychohistory, constructs a combination time capsule/oracle that on critical occasions is programmed to speak to the leaders of society about their current situation.  This proceeds smoothly for a while until an unexpected bit of chaos enters the system.
 A mutant being named the Mule is born and quickly destabilizes the orderly future that Hari Seldon had predicted.  Trends and forces that would have predictably exerted themselves on society are diverted and redefined under the influence of this perturbation.
 The effect of the Mule on this civilization is monumental, and all psychohistorical predictions are thrown off.  Or so it seems.  There exists, however, a second civilization, a Second Foundation which provides the course stabilization in the longer term.
 We might view the Second Foundation as the higher systems-level landscape that was necessary to contain the lower-level perturbation of the Mule.  In the story, the Second Foundation remains hidden “on the other side of the universe”, which turns out to mean that it is all around the First Foundation, much in the same way that nonfictional humans are only partially aware of all the forces and systems that affect their consciousness, existence, and survival.
 There are other parallels to systems theory in Asimov’s tale.  A hierarchy of levels is present in the individual-societal-universal applications of psychohistory.  In accordance with the Laws of the Levels, while the effects of psychohistorical dynamics are felt at lower levels, the purpose and the trends become apparent only at higher levels.
 Free will, which we might infer is represented in this fictional construct by the ability to be free of the predictable aspects of psychohistory, exists only at the lowest human systems level, that is, in the individual.  The higher the systems level, the more deterministic the behavior.  We might also conclude that these are more tendencies than absolutes.
 Systems theory is also manifested by the introduction of perturbation into the system.  Evolutionary mutation could be considered an example of creativity spreading throughout the system, as could thresholds and the breakdown of isotropic stability in Prigogine’s fluid systems.

 From science fiction we turn to the classic literature of Shakespeare and the tale of Macbeth.  Macbeth was a good and righteous man, until he chanced upon three witches out in the moorlands.  These witches foretold of strange and ominous, yet opportunistic, events awaiting Macbeth.  His friend, General Banquo, tried to warn him, “...oftentimes these ministers of darkness tell us truths in little things, to betray us into deeds of greatest consequence” (Lamb 1924).
 But Macbeth, perhaps having a seed of darkness cultivated within, “bent all his thoughts to acquiring the throne”.  He confided these prophesies to his wife, Lady Macbeth, herself ambitious and conniving.  Indeed, it was said that she had mastered the “art of covering treacherous purposes with smiles”.  Her response upon hearing of the witches tales was to plot the murder of the current king.  Since she felt Macbeth was “too full of the milk of human kindness” to do the deed, she decided to act alone.
 At first she hesitated when the opportunity presented itself, returning to Macbeth at night for counsel.  He, too, seemed to desire a suspension of their plans, but she commenced to rationalizing their ambitions over morality, and sent Macbeth back to the King’s chamber to finish what she had begun.
 Thereafter, some of the less-desirable aspects of the prophesies began to come true as well, prompting Macbeth, in fear for his life, to return to the witches for further signs.  The Fates deceitfully assured him of his safety.  “None of woman born” shall harm Macbeth, “until the wood of Birnam to Dunsinane Hill should come against” him.  These seeming assurances only served to give him false courage.  Had they been more straightforward, Macbeth might have escaped with his life.  The woods did move and he was indeed slain by a man not born of woman.
 How much of the quality of free will did Macbeth display?  Had the witches not burdened him with their original prophesies, the prophesies themselves would probably have not come to pass.  While this may indicate a sort of circular determinism, we might also find in this a metaphor for mutual causality.  For this future to be realized, Macbeth had to have the appropriate character tendencies in place, a condition of simple determinism.
 But what of Lady Macbeth?  Before we place too much emphasis on her as some outside initiator of Macbeth’s predicted future, we must consider that he married her and trusted her with the witches prediction.  He, passively at first as just the agent, but later actively, consented to the murder and followed a course almost certain to result in that act.
 Even after Macbeth finally grasped the extent of the Fates’ trickery and warned all men against so placing their faith, to which his adversary Macduff responded by offering him his life, Macbeth still chose to fight until his death, seemingly unable to break free of the prophesy and determinism.
 As Banquo in effect said, by focusing on the small deed we often miss the larger consequence.  What transpires at lower levels often gives no hint of the higher level purpose.  At a sufficient level, “choice” is contained and neutralized.  Macbeth was trapped within his culture and his mindset.  Without additional perspective, his fate was deterministically sealed upon delivery of the prophesies; a tragedy for certain, but perhaps one in which we are all characters.

SYNTHESIS

 There are several themes present in both of the thesis’ main elements.  One is that the pursuit and maximization of the individual’s true self-interest, both plant and human, serve to optimize the health, creativity, and diversity of both types of community and the larger systems in which they are contained.  We see this in the increased stability, diversity, and persistence of the maturing ecosystem, as suggested by Sahtouris and Odum, as well as in the societal observations of Spinoza, Smith, and Mandeville.
 This convergence is mirrored in the philosophic contribution of Thomas Hurka, who suggested that the boundary between self-interest and universal-interest are permeable and the territories fluid.  In a sense, the most rational form of self-interest, manifested by the appreciation of universal intrinsic values, becomes common-interest.
 “Free will” is a term which arrives already loaded in meaning.  The terms “free” and “freedom” imply an absoluteness, or at least a specific quality.  Exercise of the will, through volition and action, on the other hand, appears to be more of a quantity.

 Just as the quality of determinism does not belong solely to the non-human realm, the notion of will, free or otherwise, is not an exclusively human attribute.  Our presumptions about what qualitatively separates humans from other beings have been shown to be false (Wilson 1978).  Will is also a quality that exists in other beings.  In the broadest sense, the behavior of any self-contained, self-organizing system may represent an expression of will.  Predictability, probability, and obviousness do not negate will.
 In addition, we have seen that sometimes a sufficient quantitative degree can represent qualitative change.  Is there a degree of the exercise of will that is sufficient to achieve the quality of free will?
 While we may have the capacity to make far more choices than other beings, and to learn to increase our choices, is this a qualitative difference, or simply quantitative?  Conversely, while a single living cell may act in a predictable manner, we still can not assume our information is so complete as to assign complete determinism to the cell’s choices.
 Perhaps tolerance, as a strategy selected for in later successional plants, represents an increasing exercise of will in an ecosystem.  The increasing temporal persistence of later successional stages may represent the successful collective exercise of this will.  In short, as the extent of will increases with the increasing complexity of the individual organism, the extent of determinism and adherence to causality may decrease.  But in neither direction does either quality reach absoluteness.

 From the discussion of ecological succession, we can extract another theme that validates the metaphor contained in the thesis.  This is most directly illustrated in Odum’s table of successional attributes.  From the continuum of behaviors indicated for early and late successional species, we may conclude that species and individuals have evolved to employ myriad strategies for maximizing their survival and life histories.  They have made evolutionary and life-history choices to further their own best self-interests.
 Nonetheless, these same plant species, whether they have evolved strategies of inhibition, facilitation, or tolerance, are contained within, and are subject to, the higher-level purpose and forces of succession.  As perspective is further expanded spatially and temporally, self-interested actions, those choices of individuals and individual species, become less significant.  This convergence proceeds until some threshold is reached where linear stability is broken and new structures can emerge.
 This is the third relevant theme, that of incorporation.  Other forces, systems, and living things interact with plant communities to influence the changing landscape.  Systems are open, and contained within larger systems, with the possible exception of the universal.  On some higher level, choice and disturbance are incorporated and accommodated.

 Combining these themes of maximization-optimization, the ubiquity of will, and incorporation, might lead to the conclusion that ecological choice, as manifested by the successional behavior of plants, is eventually contained within a causally-dominated ecosphere, validating the characterization of absolute choice, and free will, as an illusion.  It would not appear possible for any species to completely opt out of this determinism.
 And yet we also need to be mindful of the processes that run counter to the minimizing aspects of the Law of Large Numbers, the sometimes percolating and amplifying effects of disturbance within particular systems/landscapes leading to isotropic breakdown and emergent structures.  Could free will exist or be most likely to exist at the level of the individual being?  In the following section, I will consider some implications and reflect upon the possibility of obtaining greater degrees of free will.

REFLECTIONS

 My original premise was that all succession was facilitative, that all behavior and strategies ultimately led to a species’ replacement.  Similarly, I supposed that the collective behavior of humanity would eventually and inexorably lead to its decline.  Since no self-interested species would freely or willingly pursue a course leading to its own replacement, demise, or marginalization, my assumption was that we must not possess free will.
 Succession, however, serves a purpose for the entire ecosystem and its component species.  As observed earlier, the mature ecosystem provides many benefits to its components, such as stability and diversity.  Free will then, to the extent that it exists, may manifest on a different systems level.  As Kelly Rogers stated in paraphrasing John Dewey’s philosophy, “...selfishness is simply failure to appreciate one’s comprehensive situation” (Rogers 1997).

 Fortunately, Nature may have provisions for ensuring an appreciation of the comprehensive.  We feel the effects, and seem to be led toward an ethic, an awareness, of ecosphere-threatening behavior, long before higher-level damage might even be possible.
 Many people anthropocentrically assume that we have the power to destroy the earth.  But do we?  James Lovelock points out in The Ages of Gaia that, over the course of its history, the earth has been hit by approximately 30 asteroids large enough to cause massive extinctions (Lovelock 1988).  The combined nuclear weapons exploded by humanity total only a minute fraction of the energy released by just one of these “planetessimal” collisions.  And yet the ecosphere survives, perhaps because it has co-evolved with this disturbance to the point of incorporation.
 Gaian processes such as the interrelationships of evolution, succession, and climate change, are too complex for us to currently comprehend.  We could say that we exist at a lower systems level where we may only know the mechanics, and not at higher levels where we might glimpse the purpose.  Or we could say that humanity would disappear long before the ecosphere.

What do succession and evolution portend for human futures?  How might these processes next manifest on the human, technological landscape?  Could the next technological community be the corporate community?  A hierarchy is present in the family-clan-tribe-kingdom-state-nation progression historically seen in human society.  The next community, in the manner of a true holon, would encompass all those stages that went before, with added emergent properties.
 Those properties might include an emergent view of self-interest.  As mentioned earlier, a changing societal template can modify individual notions of morality.  Corporate morality might demand that traditional self-regard be considered immoral and inhibitive to the furtherance of the corporate state.
 Whether or not we remain viable, and at what numbers and distribution, remains to be seen.  Put another way, and echoing David Hargreave’s citing of successional strategies as metaphors for human survival, will we be able to switch from a strategy of growth and inhibition/facilitation to one of tolerance?  Figuratively and literally, do we really have the choice?  Is it possible for a species moving toward marginalization or replacement to still choose its future?  Can we, as individuals, gain true free will or free“er”-will?

 Edward O. Wilson states that our biological evolution limits our cultural evolution (Wilson 1978).  Yet he believes that we do possess free will, if manifested only by our freedom to choose from among a small number of biologically-driven futures (necessary conditions argument).  But again, if the extent of choice is limited by biology and culture, is this not something less than true free will, more a variation of determinism?  A metaphor may be found in the right to vote.
 Americans often scoffed at Soviet elections because there was only a choice of one candidate or party.  And yet, imagine two complementary parties jointly monopolizing power, each assured control of approximately half the political structure.  The American construct is much more effective, compared to the other’s blatancy, because the objects of the control do not realize they are being controlled.  We might therefore reasonably judge free will, to the extent that it is perceived to exist in either system, to be an illusion.
 This also suggests the relevance of information and knowledge to the concept of free will.  As discussed earlier, hierarchies or holarchies tend to narrow and converge as they ascend in levels.  Similarly, for a given ecosystem, the possible composition of component species tends to narrow with succession, perhaps adding to the belief in a closed, end state, or climax, community.  If will manifests as a continuum, ranging from determinism to free will, could the variable be degrees of mindfulness or awareness, focusing and narrowing from diffusion or cloudedness toward states of enlightenment?  (I do not mean to imply here that accumulating factual information is akin to gaining enlightenment.  We all know those who possess much discursive knowledge, but perhaps not much wisdom, and vice versa.  By awareness, I mean to approximate that knowledge which is universal in its scope and depth.)

 The above construct represents a possible way to conceive of free will and suggests possible pathways for attaining a greater degree of it.
 One additional aspect that needs consideration is disturbance.  Even at its extreme, disturbance is facilitative to some forms of development.  Disturbance can be viewed as an ecosystem process.  In the case of Prigogine’s systems and perhaps all systems, perturbation helps define the system.
 We can illustrate this using our voting metaphor above.  It is possible that the stress on citizens under either voting regime might impel an awareness which, in turn, leads to a massive restructuring of their societies.  This threshold might be reached when the consequences to individual liberty in the existing system reach a sufficient level for collective volition, for citizen action.  Stated in Wilsonian terms, we could say that this threshold is reached when the cultural change is beyond the limits of natural, biological imperatives.  Until that point however, citizen feedback is incorporated into and helps define the system.  Similarly, in ecology, only approximately .03% of lightning strikes on vegetation result in wild fires (Vogl 1977).  The vast majority of strikes are incorporated into the existing landscape.  This aspect of punctuation, nonlinearity, and punctuated equilibrium, applies as well to my free will construct.  Our progressions and continuums are not smooth or predictable.   In bringing together the various aspects discussed above, I conclude that pathways to the attainment of greater degrees of free will may be related to the attainment of greater degrees of awareness.  Following are two metaphors that inform this presumption.

 Gregory Bateson speaks of three states, or levels, of learning: proto-learning or Learning I, deutero-learning or Learning II, and Learning III (Berman 1981).  In Learning I, the individual learns to solve a specific problem in order to obtain a specific result.  Deutero-learning involves the individual becoming skilled in problem solving in general.  S/he “learns to learn”, but only within the context of hir experiential and cultural paradigm.  Level III is that rare realm where the individual recognizes the existence and nature of the paradigm, the nature of problem-solving itself in the above example.  Put another way, Level I would learn that certain rolls of the dice would produce certain moves of a game piece.  Level II might learn the rules of this and other games.  Level III might realize that it is a game and comprehend the nature of games.  Achieving a Level III awareness might bring a measure of free will.
 Stephen Wolinsky, in his book Trances People Live, suggests that most people live under the influence of trances, or a restricting of attention (Wolinsky 1991).  We are taught and led, primarily by culture, toward not only a limiting, but a retraining of our attention, in such a way that we are kept from acquiring the sort of knowledge and enlightenment that would free us from these delusional trances.  It follows then, that the therapeutic response to these cultural, delusional states would be to assist in “waking up” from these trances.
 It is not by coincidence that I selected these two metaphors to illuminate the question of “can”.  The answer to our final question, that concerning the “how” of free will, relates to these two perspectives.
 The first approach is predicated upon systems thinking.  We can see all around us examples of attempts to control proprietary cultures through the control of awareness and information.  Whether by the Third Reich, Monsanto, Microsoft, or religious Fundamentalists, the attempt is to limit will by cutting off the ventilating and informing aspects of the open system.  Since closed systems do not naturally persist, much energy is expended to preserve these micro cultures within the context of the larger.  But even in the larger culture, institutional forces systemically act on our Level II awareness to distract us from realizing the potential of the open system of consciousness and will.
 I agree with Spinoza.  The path toward free will may lie in seeking ultimate knowledge and infinite choice through the opening of human systems.  This pathway, what might be termed the outer route, suggests that we increase our potential for free will by seeking an expansion of our knowledge and wisdom, as well as the opening of as many human systems as we are subject to.
 In addition to this outer seeking, we might also seek to free ourselves from the delusions and trances that have become ingrained within our consciousness.  This inner track toward free will relates to the Eastern corollary of Spinoza’s philosophy.  In the Buddhist tradition, enlightenment is approached through innerwork and meditation.  Not just Buddhism, but spirituality and innerwork of any sort may serve to open similar pathways by helping free the individual of the constraints of learned thought and consciousness.  Through innerwork we might access the infinite, the first cause and prime mover within, and approach that relationship with the singularity and purpose to which both Spinoza and Feibleman alluded.

 There is determinism at all systems levels of human and plant behavior; determinism is present in succession, as well as human behavior and futures.  But free will is not an unachievable impossibility.  It exists and a measure of it may be accessible to the individual.

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