I would like to add a few comments to Roger Farnworth's piece, Determinism and Free Will in C101.
I assume he equates physical determinism to causality. Now it might well be true that our interpretations of causality can only ever be assumptions but I doubt he can rely on 'observations of quanta' to replace causality with dice. Quantum uncertainty is vastly over-rated. Basically, this is nothing more than the old particle / wave problem. Particles have position, whereas when they travel as waves, which they do, they merely have wavelength. In other words, they are spread across a definite, albeit small, area of space; and their position becomes, you guessed, uncertain. Incidentally, I have to thank Brian Greene's book, The Elegant Universe, Cape, 1999, for this devastatingly obvious, yet undoubtedly elegant, explanation. By the way, the book concerns superstrings, a theory which has more to commend it than most.
Now is Roger’s determinism any different. Indeed, is determinism any different from physical determinism, causality, or predestination. Our brains are physical objects: our thoughts, words, and deeds are the end result of a multitude of little waves or particles wandering about in our brains; triggered by our experiences; along paths set by our genes, amended by our past; and stored equally physically in our memory. In turn our memory, in the light of the Aspect investigation of the EPR thought experiment, could be anywhere in the universe. Is there any room for free will in this melee?
Possibly, but only by a major stretch of the imagination. Suppose we have, or had, a role to play in the initiation of the universe. I'm not saying we thought it into existence, but merely that we inadvertently set the ball rolling, so to speak. In other words we originated the waves which gave rise to the universe we now inhabit: a universe as accidental and evolving as you like. You must admit that this is at least an original solution to our view of universal expansion; and a damn sight more likely than a particle which, confused by the uncertainty principle, suddenly found it had popped up out of nowhere and promptly inflated itself, rather conveniently before the laws of physics arose to constrain it, despite it being matter; and without consideration of how it could be said to have inflated before anything else existed against which this remarkable spurt in growth could be measured. I'm sorry if this offends anyone who believes this guff but it really is too farcical to contemplate unless you're being paid to contemplate it.
Nevertheless, how could we set the ball rolling before we existed? Well, I happen to believe that we are eternal beings, currently acting through a body, and initiated by God. Could free will reside in what remains of that spark of involuntary creativity which must now compete with its environment and with the others of its like. It might simply be a matter of either believing in God or not, which attitude must have an influence on many of our actions. Of course, it's all a matter of belief, but then isn't everything?
I would like to ask Roger one question however. Why should we treat with more compassion those bound by determinism to offend society? Wouldn't it make more sense to just have them put down? What is compassion and why should it be shown to an automaton? ... er ... make that three questions.
Anthony Owens