Something that has bothered me for years in psychology and neurology are these ideas and this sort of construction and explanation of them.

Studies have shown that when people’s brains are stimulated in such a way as to trigger a physical movement, say, in the hand, the subjects report an intention to move their hand. The intention, “I want to move my hand,” which feels like the cause, is actually an effect of the beginning of the motor sequence.

Even worse is the one that goes “the signals that triggered a finger movement began a full half-second before any decision about movement” and that sort of thing — thus in the minds of the researchers disproving free will.

I’m not here to argue about free will and I’m trying to keep opaque philosophy terms out of this discussion, but here’s what’s wrong with all of this: it’s all you.

People think of the brain/mind/body in Cartesian dualist frames (oops, here come some of those terms, and yes I know that is a trinary) reflexively even when they think they have rejected it. There is no homunculus, no little being sitting in the cockpit somewhere in your pate just behind your dura mater issuing commands.

In reality, the brain is a motley collection of competing and cooperating systems that don’t have full monitoring capabilities of other system’s states. When someone stimulates part of your brain to move your hand, and nothing else seems to be wrong, the rest of your brain is like, “Huh, guess I meant to do that. I [meaning that motley collection of oddball systems] wanted to do that.”

Can you think of any evolutionary reason your brain would say, “That ain’t me moving my hand! Must be some researcher stimulating it with an electrode!” Seen many neurologists with electrodes on the African savanna a million year ago? No? I thought not.

The point I’m making is that your brain’s systems can’t really be decoupled. When you move a finger, it’s all you, even the nerve impulse that started half a second before you “decided” to move. (How can this research be this moronic?)

It’s all you, baby. It’s all you.