A Famous Argument Against Free Will Has Been Debunked (2019)

However, I'd like to add a hypothetical „counterpoint“ (meant as a thinking draft, not a real argument): What if our human concept of time is not even a close estimate of the actual reality? If we haven't yet fully grasped what time really is, then there might be other sources for free will than we currently can even think of. Consider this analogy: what if what we perceive as time operates more like color in a dimension just above our understanding (of reality)? If these „colors“, like frequencies, mix and blend, they could result in countless timelines and realities overlapping. In such a (unrealistic) scenario, free will could arise from interactions across these myriad timelines, rather than being strictly confined to our current perception of deterministic physical processes. Sure, this thought is full of flaws, just trying to sketch out that even though i think your argument is valid, I wouldn’t be so sure about it being „the only argument needed“. The sheer possibility that we have a totally inaccurate understanding of fundamental concepts like time should remind us, to not be too sure in thinking that there can not be any source of free will other than things what we can perceive in our realities.

But yes, valid point of yours. I will have to think about this a few more times in the future. But i believe (probably just wishful thinking), that there is more to it, than just cause and effect in our observable universe & perceivable realities.

Like moving your arm to drink a sugary drink. Sure, zooming in on the atoms, B moves because A moved and so on. Clearly deterministic. But who is looking at the sugar-molecules that are triggering the chain? And who is looking at the countless years of evolution making me crave it & reach for it? Sure, still deterministic processes. But when looking at the atoms in my arm moving, observing deterministic processes and stop looking, we would just ignore the component of time & evolution that made this deterministic process possible AND made it happen „right now“.

And then also the societal influence…

Maybe i should have started asking about your understanding of free will and then compare it to mine. Maybe i am not even thinking of „free will“ as truly non-deterministic, but just simulated non-determinism. The closest example i can think of right now would be something like a GPT model running in real time, finetuned over the existence of life…

Which should still be closer to „non-deterministic“ than to „deterministic“, at least in regard of what we as humans can perceive.

Anyway, i didn‘t even read the article yet. Probably should start to do that before commenting thinking drafts like this.