There is a very dangerous myth that is out there surrounding free will and neuroscience of the human mind. There are people whom are spreading misinformation out there and unfortunately one of them is Sam Harris. Someone whom in so many other ways has always been so great at defending the reality of The Universe against the unreality of theistic mysticism. Yet, on and on in the passed decade he has slowly faded into insanity which includes denying the existence of the self and the will of that self.
The idea that the self is not real is not scientific at all. The self is the way of identifying all of the processes within your brain between your ears. The fact that the self is a natural thing that is your brain and not supernatural does not mean the self does not exist. The nonexistence of a literal soul does not mean there is no mind as your mind is the workings of your brain. Thus your brain is that which mystics call your soul and that is itself the humans individual mind.
Within the workings of your mind of course is cause and effect. It is a naturalistic and materialistic in the meaning of the word vs immaterial nonexistence of a supernatural soul or spirit. However, that does not all mean we have no free will at all. In fact, quite the opposite we have in a sense been determined by the very nature of our homo-sapien brains to be free in our wills. In this sense there is for sure determinism in our nature.
We do have evolved psychologies and many of our predispositions and tendencies certainly are coming from this evolved nature of our psychology. No doubt many of those very true sex based differences between males and females have came from these evolved differences. Our instincts that we do definitely have come from this very evolved nature. However, the existence of these evolved traits of our both divergent and shared human traits does not in anyway equal us not having self-regulation, self-control or a will of our own. The existence in us as in all material in this world of a cause and effect does not mean we are predetermined by these instincts and lower order natures as it were.
Yes, evolutionary psychology is more than likely the least incorrect view of psychology that humans would fall into. However, the fact that there is cause and effect. The fact that were are determined in this way does not make us deterministic creatures in the sense of hard determinism and predetermined to be x, y or z. We are in fact as I mentioned earlier determined to be free and science is showing that this very evolutionary psychology is what causes that sense we have known as free will. Of course, where else would a will come from, but, evolution we are evolved animals it could come nothing, but, evolution.
We can know free will exists very easily and this is an experiment done by Daniel Dennett in his lectures on free will. Which is that if someone throws a ball at someone that person can either move and not be hit or not move and be hit dead on. The fact that you can choose to move or choose not to move is in fact a very fundamental evidence of at least a decent enough sense of freedom to matter to anyone. The fact that people could stay at his lecture or leave or not even have came is also an evidence of free will.
There is measurable free will and it literally can be measured in experiments. We have a will, we have self-regulation and self-control. We also above all else can choose to think about a matter or not to think, and, then to act accordingly. It is this that is one of our main freedoms of will as the animal we are as a homosapien. As long as one can choose to think or choose not to think of the consequences and then act accordingly we have as free of a will as we as a species would ever want. Free will does not mean there is no causes and no effects. It does not mean there is no predispositions and no tendencies or pushes or pulls of primordial pre-modernity within our minds at all.
We have all kinds of subconsciousness within our minds no doubt and no one that has ever defended the existence of free will would say otherwise. This does not invalidate the idea of freedom of will which is based primarily on the reality that we are not predetermined entities where everyone man, woman and child will always act the same way and will make many different decisions in their lives. Neuroscience does not as some have said disprove free will in fact neuroscience is proving the existence of this aspect of human nature more and more over time. Despite what the really delusional anti-free will hard determinism myth preaches free will is alive and well.
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