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Brains & Minds

Consciousness, Freewill and Language

Michael Langford talks about the language we use to talk about the mind and brain.

Rejections of freewill have been common in recent philosophical debate (e.g., in Norman Bacrac’s article ‘Epiphenomenalism Explained’ in Philosophy Now 81). The question is, are the choices we make really free, or are they predetermined consequences of the laws of physics? If I knew enough about you and your environment, could I in principle predict your choices? (And would this mean you had no freewill?) Increasingly the freewill argument has been linked to different philosophical views about the nature of the mind.

One frequent version of the anti-freewill argument goes like this: modern neuroscience shows us not only that thinking is accompanied by neurological activity, but that this activity should be understood as the sole cause or explanation of all thought.

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