Terry,
The inescapable, as you put it, is the very question you have set up that I feel is meaningless and paradoxical. In other words, it is simply a mind game.
As I understand what you are trying to say, because I must inevitably choose, therefore I am not free. And if I could get beyond, or transcend Choice, I would then be free, but only then. I suppose we could say God is in the same position, since He could Create or Not Create. But in His choosing to Create, He was Not Free. In a way, the ultimate absurdity!
Let us say, for a moment, that I am faced with a choice, to do something, or not to do something, say like "Go to the moon and back." If I am merely a physical, biological being, and that is all there is, then I would concede that a pretty good case could be made that my choice would probably be done from a pre-disposition to choose one way or the other.
But what if there is more to me than that? For example, what if I had lived in some past life, and the essence that is me survived and is now living in my present physical body? This then, sets up an entirely different set of parameters respecting choice than what your limited, materialistic assumptions do in terms of the manner is which "I" do my choosing. Which is why I have to ask "How is it that the necessity of choosing negates any and all freedom of choice?
If I am, of necessity, faced with the inevitability of choice, what has that got to do with the What, Why, Where, When and How of choosing? As a matter of fact, I may just discard all of the rational criteria of choosing, flip a coin, and dive right in to the random decision.
Dennett, the materilist, concedes that Determinism and Freedom coexist. He also went further by suggesting that "Agency is not merely a biological possession, but is also more than that, because of our capacity to transcend it." He explains that through history, man learned to control nature and to regulate its input upon our lives, and this is also part of our Agency. As a result, he sees this as a Political issue, not a Scientific one.
I would venture further by suggesting another possibility. What if, for the sake of argument, we possess a "Spirit" inside our biological entity that transcends even biology and history/politics. And what if THAT is what governs Agency/Choice, rather than the biological entity with its brain functions? And with the death of the body, the Spirit leaves the body, with its Agency intact, going elsewhere (Heaven, Hell, Spirit World, Purgatory, Astral Plane, Reincarnation, etc.)?
While the statement that "the self is not the entity that governs brain processes, but is the outcome of these processes" is a neat twist, I fail to see how it necessarily follows that:
"Free will is not the capacity to do something, but rather to know that something is being done in your name." For if there is more to this material universe than what we can see, hear, feel, smell and touch, then perhaps there is a certain essence within our biological being that is the true centre of our Being, from which we exercise our Agency. In that case, our physical brain activity is merely reflecting an awareness of what is being done in our name, but the act of Will from our true essence is still the Agency of choice.
Finally, it disturbs me that all you materialists and scientists refuse to accept the possibility of anything beyond your physically observable universe through the medium of your puny, limited instruments of technology. After all, it was not that long ago that scientists pronounced that they had discovered all of the laws of the universe, and the rest of scientific discovery and progress would be devoted to finding the relationships of these laws in juxtaposition with one another.....And then along came Eistein's General and Special Theories of Relativity, and Particle Physics. The rest, as they say, is history.
And for the record, I am well aware that the subject of the "Soul" or "Spirit" is a whole other subject, which I am quite willing and prepared to enter into on another thread. But then, Terry, you already have a pretty good idea where I would be heading with that one.
Rod P.
p.s. You do have some good ideas, but I'm still gonna debate 'em. If I have to accept Determinism, it ain't gonna be without a good fight!
