The Free Will Illusion 2: Responsibility

On the one hand you have God. God knows everything and is able to do everything. That is the point of omnipotence and omniscience. God created everything, including us, and then, the stories say, gave us free will. Now, there is a paradox in that. The concept of Free Will demands that we have the ability to make our own choices, but that’s impossible because God already knows exactly what those choices are going to be. What is more, he could have changed any of them simply by having things develop slightly differently right from the beginning. The moment he creates the initial starting conditions he knows exactly how everything will end, thereby undermining and concept of Free Will. This is called determinism and, within our logic system as it exists right now, is very difficult to refute.

On the other hand we have cold hard science, which won’t accept the existence of the soul unless it is proven. According to our current scientific models we are a series of chemical reactions and electronic impulses, which move and act according to what chemicals are predominant and which nerve endings are firing. Science also teaches us that any process, if all the variables are known, can be predicted. This means that according to science everything has also been predetermined, even if it remains beyond our ability to know what that path will be.

So, if you’re honest about it, both science and monotheistic religions do not accept the existence of Free Will. So what does that mean for us? The biggest problem with the absence of Free Will is that it means there is no longer any responsibility. It becomes very easy for anybody to say ‘yeah, but I didn’t have a choice, did I? Everything has already been decided.’

That’s a real pickle, because our entire law system as it exists right now is based on the principle of responsibility. If somebody isn’t responsible for his actions, well then they can’t be punished for them either. This is what the insanity defense is based on, as well as the reason that information acquired under coercion is not admissible in court (torture takes away choice from the tortured).

For the last couple of days I’ve been trying to figure out what to make of this. There is some vague notion running around in my head, at this point, about the Illusion of Free Will (i.e. the idea that we are incapable of predicting somebody’s choice, therefore they can be considered to have Free Will even when they don’t) being just as useful as actual Free Will (especially since it’s impossible for us to tell the difference), but the pieces haven’t quite clicked together yet. It still feels that if you take away Free Will then you take away responsibility.

Does anybody know any way out of this predicament?