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4 The Animal Sensorium
that when the level of sugar falls, or the level of impurities rises, the organism
automatically initiates certain standard patterns of movement to ingest food
or discharge waste.
Mysteriously, nature chooses not to operate that way. Instead, the animal is
made to feel the need to eat, drink and engage in reproductive behavior, and
is given the freedom to chose when and how it will carry out the action. We
refer to that as free will.
The phenomenon of feeling is an uncanny mystery of nature: It is as
incomprehensible to us as conscious awareness is. We feel the wish to do something, and then freely elect to do it in any one of a large number of equally
valid ways. Also, we are free to suppress the feeling, and very often we do. The
more important a course of behavior is to survival, the more strongly we are
made to experience the urge to do it, and the more difficult it is to resist.
An animal’s Sensorium is the repository of its sensations, emotions and
volitions. It is a necessary instrument of coercion that pushes individuals into
carrying out biologically necessary behavior. For us, it is the driver of the human
vehicle, forcing us to act rather than remain quiescent, to nourish ourselves,
attend to our immediate and long-term needs and care for those with whom
we share our gene-pool. It imposes its commandments without specifying the
details, and it is this latitude that is called free will.
The question of free will is not a moral one but a biological question which
plays a crucial role in animate life. Does a one-celled organism have a Sensorium
and is it able to act freely? In a later chapter I will cite relevant research by
cell biologists which shows that single-celled animals exhibit a great deal of
autonomy in their behavior, and have internal states that it would not be too
fanciful to call sensations. These internal events direct them to initiate certain
action patterns and suppress others. There is strong evidence for the claim
that one-celled animals have a simple kind of Sensorium, and their actions are
initiated by a form of feeling. 7
4 The Animal Sensorium
that when the level of sugar falls, or the level of impurities rises, the organism
automatically initiates certain standard patterns of movement to ingest food
or discharge waste.
Mysteriously, nature chooses not to operate that way. Instead, the animal is
made to feel the need to eat, drink and engage in reproductive behavior, and
is given the freedom to chose when and how it will carry out the action. We
refer to that as free will.
The phenomenon of feeling is an uncanny mystery of nature: It is as
incomprehensible to us as conscious awareness is. We feel the wish to do something, and then freely elect to do it in any one of a large number of equally
valid ways. Also, we are free to suppress the feeling, and very often we do. The
more important a course of behavior is to survival, the more strongly we are
made to experience the urge to do it, and the more difficult it is to resist.
An animal’s Sensorium is the repository of its sensations, emotions and
volitions. It is a necessary instrument of coercion that pushes individuals into
carrying out biologically necessary behavior. For us, it is the driver of the human
vehicle, forcing us to act rather than remain quiescent, to nourish ourselves,
attend to our immediate and long-term needs and care for those with whom
we share our gene-pool. It imposes its commandments without specifying the
details, and it is this latitude that is called free will.
The question of free will is not a moral one but a biological question which
plays a crucial role in animate life. Does a one-celled organism have a Sensorium
and is it able to act freely? In a later chapter I will cite relevant research by
cell biologists which shows that single-celled animals exhibit a great deal of
autonomy in their behavior, and have internal states that it would not be too
fanciful to call sensations. These internal events direct them to initiate certain
action patterns and suppress others. There is strong evidence for the claim
that one-celled animals have a simple kind of Sensorium, and their actions are
initiated by a form of feeling. 7