@Matias How can you tell the difference between randomness and free will in an objectively verifiable way? Electrons tend to move towards a state of maximum entropy but not always. Humans tend to do things to benefit humanity but not always.

How do we know that there isn't some ordered underlying chaos that determines the actions of both humans and electrons?

Isn't our conscious awareness framed by all our unconscious memories of prior experiences? And if this so, isn't free will a delusional homunculus?

@Gmak I don’t think memory has to come into play. Why do you think that unconscious memories frame our conscious awareness? I can be aware without remembering or even thinking. That is common in meditation.

There are people who have had brain damage who can only remember for a short while, yet they are consciously aware of their existence.

@WilliamFleming

[citeseerx.ist.psu.edu]

@WilliamFleming

Cognitive scientists always worry about the homunculus in the mind. Probably no such thing a free will. It's akin to believing in God or the tooth fairy. Read the article. It's quite interesting. The authors argue that "top-down control [free will] is not, after all, only control by the 'self'', but instead it is control mediated by other minds and more generally by culture."

Another article on the social underpinnings of our "autonomy":

[s3.amazonaws.com]

@Gmak I need only read the abstract to know that the authors were far off-track before they even began. It’s not a question of top-down control via a homunculus. I have made no such claim and am unaware of any serious claim like that by anyone. The idea is preposterous.

I have no academic credentials in that area but I do have ideas and opinions. IMO our bodies are robots with no free will and no conscious awareness. There is bodily sentience—robots routinely are equipped with sense receptors, but it seems impossible that neural impulses could create the kind of deep awareness that we enjoy—I agree with them on that.

Since conscious awareness can not be explained by rote electrochemical processes, their reaction is to declare that conscious awareness does not exist. They HAVE to make such a determination or else their entire materialistic world view would come crashing down.

Does reality consist of particles of matter moving through space and time? According to quantum gravity theory a particle of matter is not a “thing”, rather it is an interaction between covariant quantum fields. There’s no such thing as time. As far as space, space is nothing like what we imagine—an infinite expanse of emptiness. Space consists of a finite number of granules of planck length size.

The philosophy of materialism is DOA and clinging to that world view is futile. Physicists have long since quit such a simplistic perspective, so why do we continue to see these articles such as this one that you have cited?

What are we? We are not our bodies. Our conscious selves are not illusions brought about by rote physical processes in our bodies. Our bodies, along with the entire physical world of our perception, are illusions brought about by conscious awareness. We are conscious awareness itself, existing in ultimate reality.

@WilliamFleming
I guess you can hope your solipsistic, nonmaterialistic worldview will save you from global warming or being run over by a bus...

@Gmak My worldview is aligned with science.

@WilliamFleming

Last time I checked, science was based on evidence. All I see here is your unfalsifiable opinion that the mind has characteristics akin to quantum physics. Holding that unfalsifiable opinions are aligned with science would make Popper role over in his grave!

@Gmak Part of my opinion is based on intuitive insights that can not be verified by science in its current state, however it is an opinion promulgated by many eminent scholars and physicists over the last hundred years.

The “nonmaterialistic” part of my opinion has been so well established in physics since the time of Faraday and Maxwell that it needs no further verification.

Sir Arthur Eddington:

“The universe is of the nature of a thought or sensation in a universal Mind... To put the conclusion crudely — the stuff of the world is mind-stuff.

“We are no longer tempted to condemn the spiritual aspects of our nature as illusory because of their lack of concreteness.

“The scientific answer is relevant so far as concerns the sense-impressions... For the rest the human spirit must turn to the unseen world to which it itself belongs.”

Wolfgang Pauli:

“To us ... the only acceptable point of view appears to be the one that recognizes both sides of reality-the quantitative and the qualitative, the physical and the psychical-as compatible with each other, and can embrace them simultaneously ... It would be most satisfactory of all if physis and psyche (i.e., matter and mind) could be seen as complementary aspects of the same reality.”

Max Planck said in 1944, "As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clear headed science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as a result of my research about atoms this much: There is no matter as such. All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter".

@Gmak Awareness and appreciation for existence in reality as a consciously aware entity lends the keenest motivation to survive and live well, and it brings peace and joy.