Another discussion on the existence of free will. To most people the question seems silly, of course humans have free will. Then ask these people to define free will. Not so easy. Certainly not for people who have committed themselves to the belief that every effect has a prior cause. And I mean every effect, all the the way down to every atomic interaction of everything in existence, including, I’m afraid, the human brain. On this view, even every one of our brain states had a prior cause in biochemistry, each one in turn eventually reducible to physics. Hence, from the second you were born, right up to the present, your behaviors have been determined. (Note determined does not necessarily mean knowable). There’s no getting around this, unless you care to challenge the laws of physics. I don’t, which is why I side with Nietzsche, who (supposedly) said of free will: “It is the ability to pull oneself from the swamp by their own hair.”
Having said that, I have always argued, and continue to believe that my (un-coerced) actions certainly seem to me to have been freely chosen by me. If I do something wrong I expect people to seek justice for that wrong based on the belief that I could have done otherwise. Because I submit that, with relatively few exceptions, every human being holds the belief that all human action is indeterminate before it occurs. Meaning, of course, every action could have been different. It’s always seemed that way to me, too.
And yet, in reason and logic, the incompatibilist in me sees the contradiction. In light of what is known of the laws of physics and the immutability of cause and effect, I see no way around this contradiction, and for what it’s worth I’m not alone*.
* See, for instance, the comments of “SilverAce” at the the first link.
