Free Will Is Real (with Kevin Mitchell)

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4.7 • 4.3K Ratings

🗓️ 15 December 2025

⏱️ 92 minutes

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Summary

Are we truly characters with agency, or are we just playing out our programming in the great video game of life? Contrary to those in his field who claim that free will is an illusion, neuroscientist Kevin Mitchell insists that we're agents who wield our decision-making mechanism for our own purposes. Listen as the author of Free Agents: How Evolution Gave Us Free Will explains to EconTalk's Russ Roberts why the debate between free will and determinism rests on a flawed foundation, and how the evolution of the ability to make choices and take actions provides the best argument for human agency. Topics include why habits, rather than simply limiting our freedom, also help us live better lives, and the role emotions such as guilt, shame, and regret play in building our character.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:07.9	I'm your host, Russ Roberts, of Sholem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:13.8	Go to EconTalk.org, where you can subscribe, comment on this episode, and find links and other information related to today's conversation.
0:21.2	You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done going back to 2006.
0:26.7	Our email address is mail at econTalk.org.
0:30.0	We'd love to hear from you.
0:36.7	Today is November 12, 2025, and my guest is neuroscientist Kevin Mitchell.
0:41.7	His latest book is Free Agents, How Evolution Gave Us Free Will.
0:47.0	Kevin, welcome to eContoc.
0:48.9	Oh, thanks very much.
0:49.7	Thanks for having me.
0:50.7	This is a deep, subtle, nuanced, fresh look at a very old question, the question of
0:57.8	free will versus determinism. But it's much more than that. It's an overview of evolution.
1:03.4	It's an overview of how evolution created increasingly complex life forms here on Earth.
1:10.0	And most interesting to me, it's a very nuanced framework for thinking about what it means to be a human being.
1:17.4	Related episodes on the other side of the free will determinism debate include my discussion with Robert Sapolsky on his book, Determined, and the recent episode with Gere of Surrey on his book,
1:29.2	with Jay McClellan, The Emergent Mind.
1:33.3	Kevin, you start with a beautiful metaphor
1:35.8	of the video game that your son's playing.
1:39.3	And the difference between your son as a player
1:43.7	and the bartender, who is what's called an
1:47.4	n-PC a non-player character who your son as a player encounters in the game uh explain why that
	...

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