We do or don't have free will, depending on how you look at it...sort of.

Free will is rather frustrating to debate, no matter what stance you take. The reason is that the key words involved are so difficult to precisely define. Just what the heck is a "choice", and what does it mean for a choice to be "free"? Ask a hundred people and you'll get a hundred answers. Don't bother breaking out the dictionary either, because these are concepts that are very difficult, and perhaps impossible, to truly capture with words. I propose a series of criteria for identifying whether an observer can call the action of an agent a "free choice". These criteria are compatible with a fully deterministic universe, and with the existence or lack of a soul. Please do not bring up the distinction between whether or not an observer can call an action "free" and whether the action really is "free", because this is a whole other subject involving what knowledge and properties really are, and this topic is confusing enough already. My opponent will argue that the following criteria do not reflect what "free will" actually is, perhaps by giving an example of an agent that we would not consider to be capable of making a free choice but which nonetheless fits the criteria. My opponent may also argue that there is no universal definition of free will, or that it is a concept that is inherently impossible to define. What my opponent will NOT do is try to argue whether or not we truly have free will. I will respond to criticism mildly, as I'd actually like to refine this theory and it will take more than one perspective to do so. Here goes: 1. It must be conceivable that the agent could have acted another way. Here I must make an important distinction between "conceivable" and physically possible. Our knowledge of the brain is limited: perhaps there is only one way the electric and chemical signals could have gone without violating the laws of physics. Quantum events may play a role, but we don't know exactly what. However, this is all for naught because we're incapable of reasoning in terms of electrons and chemical interactions when we're discussing issues at this level. For a choice to be possible, it must simply be consistent with our worldview that the agent could have acted another way. This step is heavily determined by the observer, as two people can disagree on whether a choice was free if they disagree on what actions the agent could have possibly taken. 2. It must be conceivable that the agent has the ability to rate each action according to some criteria. A person may take the easiest course of action, or the most pleasurable, or the most exciting, or the most safe, the most cheap, the most rewarding, and so forth. More likely they rate actions by many criteria. 3. The agent must have the ability to act on one of many possible criteria, where the rating given to the action is proportional to the probability that the action will be chosen. If Suzy likes bacon better than ham, she will probably order bacon when given the choice between the two. However, this doesn't mean she ALWAYS will. 4. The agent must be able to choose the criteria by which to rate each action, except in certain cases. Yes, I'm defining choice in terms of choice (yay recursion!). Whether the otherwise infinite regress stops is when we reach something like a biological urge which doesn't really boil down to anything more. I believe this is the hardest part of the theory to define and probably the weakest, so if you're going to attack it I'd suggest starting here. 5. The more layers of indirection in step #4 before we reach a bottom level, the more "free" the choice was. Like all living things, most of us strive to continue our existence, and the existence of our species, except for the small subset of emo kids who know the proper way to hold a razor. However, we consider ourselves to have freedom of choice because there are so many layers between the choices we make on a day to day basis, and pure survival. In fact, there are so many layers that sometimes things can get topsy turvy and wind up having no relation to biological survival whatsoever. Of course that's another subject altogether.