Do human beings have free will?
This timeless and rather unsettling question has nagged many people (some of whom perversely enjoy such nagging questions and become philosophers) through the ages. There are three common answers to this question, each having its own assumptions and implications. I will present them and evaluate them in order from least to most interesting. Yup. Free will exists. The first and perhaps most common view is “Yes, human beings have free will.” This is commonly taken to mean that my pinky wiggles as a consequence of my having intended it to wiggle. I will myself to do something and I subsequently do it. This theory is very simple and seems perfectly reasonable. It presumes that we have control over our thoughts, actions, and destinies. Oddly, this reassures many people; not that they could do anything about it if they didn’t have free will… Yes, but we only have free will to do certain things. A second division of the belief in free will is selective belief in free will. There are some th
