To me, and many others who consider that any "free will" worthy of that name should be really free, articles like Eddy Nahmias' Why we have free will in the most recent issue of Scientific American rest on an absurd proposition.
Namias basically argues that because conscious thinking affects our behavior, this points to free will. In other words, our actions aren't solely controlled by unconscious brain processes. He says:
A body of psychological research shows that conscious, purposeful processing of our thoughts really does make a difference to what we do.
OK. No argument there. But consider what Einstein said (quoted in another of my posts about the fiction of free will).
Honestly I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom?
What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said, "Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills."…When you mention people who speak of such a thing as free will in nature it is difficult for me to find a suitable reply. The idea is of course preposterous.
Now Nahmias would argue that feeling and thinking are different. A feeling comes from the unconscious; thinking is a conscious activity.
But Einstein's point remains. Whatever we decide to do, for whatever reason, there is no reason to believe that the basis of the decision stands apart from the deterministic laws of nature that guide everything else in the universe.
And yes, I am familiar with the indeterminism of quantum mechanics.
However, as much wiser minds than mine have said, indeterminism doesn't support free will; rather, it implies the lack thereof, since random behavior is the opposite of intentional action.
What Nahmias has done is redefine free will to the much-diluted compatibilist definition. Compatibilism, Wikipedia tells us, "is the belief that free will and determinism are compatible ideas, and that it is possible to believe both without being logically inconsistent."
Well, I and many others disagree.
This simply isn't how almost all people look upon free will. A compatibilist would say that a girl has free will if she can choose between two puppies without coercion by her father, or anyone else. One puppy is a blonde Labrador; the other is a black Labrador.
But as discussed in a quote in a previous post, the girl has a psychological condition that makes her incapable of touching a blonde dog. So she chooses the black Lab. Supposedly she exercised her free will according to Nahmias, because she consciously thought, "I like the black Lab much better."
Part of the quote says:
The classical compatibilist analysis of ‘could have done otherwise’ fails. According to the analysis, when Danielle picked up the black Lab, she was able to pick up the blonde Lab, even though, due to her psychological condition, she was not able to do so in the relevant respect. Hence, the analysis yields the wrong result.
The classical compatibilist attempt to answer the incompatibilist objection failed. Even if an unencumbered agent does what she wants, if she is determined, at least as the incompatibilist maintains, she could not have done otherwise. Since, as the objection goes, freedom of will requires freedom involving alternative possibilities, classical compatibilist freedom falls.
Most people look upon free will in exactly that fashion: a choice that could have gone another way.
A robber points a gun at a bank teller. He can either pull the trigger, or fail to fire the gun. Upon that decision, if he is caught, rests a very different legal outcome: guilty of theft or guilty of murder?
This presumes, of course, that all of the deterministic causes and effects acting upon the robber at that moment -- genetics, upbringing, past experiences of all kinds, current state of mind, etc. etc. -- can be overcome in an act of unfettered free will which somehow is able to exist outside of the usual deterministic laws of cause and effect.
There is no evidence that this is possible. A simple thought experiment shows why.
Imagine that the conditions existing in the universe, naturally including your own body and brain, are exactly the same in moment A as in moment B. In other words, every molecule, every atom, every subatomic particle, every quantum energy state, everything is exactly the same in these two moments.
If you made a decision at moment A to buy, say, a vanilla ice cream cone, what are the chances that you would decide differently, such as to buy a chocolate cone, at moment B?
Remember: your state of mind is precisely the same as it was in moment A (since mind is the brain in motion, and your brain is in the exact same state). So is everything else in physical existence. Thus some sort of supernatural nonphysical entity must be responsible for altering your decision to buy a vanilla cone at moment B.
Soul. Spirit. God's will. Karma. Something like that.
Unless, again, we define "free will" as simply acting under deterministic influences that don't include obvious coercive factors like having somone point a gun at your head and say, "Buy a vanilla cone, or I'll shoot you."
That's how compatibilists like Nahmias think. We're "free" so long as our actions and choices are determined by non-blatant causes. Doesn't make sense, but the notion of free will is so appealing to them, they're deeply reluctant to surrender it.
Of course, they have no choice.
For someone else's knowledgeable critical take on Nahmias, check out Jerry Coyne's "Eddy Nahmias: apostle for free will."