Existence of Human Freewill

Why Determinism is Wrong My opponent gives two definitions, one for determinism and the other for indeterminism. He states that determinism is "the idea that all reactions are caused by previous reactions." I would like to expand on this a little before I explain the wavefunction argument. Dictionary.com tells us that determinism is: 1. the doctrine that all facts and events exemplify natural laws. 2. the doctrine that all events, including human choices and decisions, have sufficient causes.1 Additionally, determinism is obviously derived from the word determine, which means, in this context, “to conclude or ascertain, as after reasoning, observation, etc.”2 Again, determinism is the idea that everything can be determined – basically, everything can be predicted even if it was impractical and painstaking. This idea is wrong, and has been proven wrong since the study of quantum mechanics, and the waves of probability that they really are. My opponent now states “If humans could collapse their wavefunctions the concept of freewill could be justified.” Well, let us go back to my Round 2 argument: I said in Round 2, “When we observe the particle, and yes, it is merely the act of observation, we collapse the wavefunction and make it one hundred percent probable a particle will be at a certain position.” I apologise for not making this statement more clear: observation is what causes a wavefunction to collapse from probability to certainty.3 That last sentence is very important, there is actually a debate within the scientific community as to how consciousness plays a role in the collapse of wavefunctions,4 because so far our human act of observation is one of the only things that can cause it; and, like I said, since humans collapse wavefunctions to determine the future in an otherwise indeterminate state, we have free will. Finite Influence on Free Will My opponent attempts to refute my argument with his analogy of a piece of paper with a single number written across it. He states that: “This paper could have an infinitive range of numbers written on it, thus possibility for an infinite number of variables regarding this single piece of paper.” I am going to be honest, that is a very clever argument, however I will show how it is flawed. He states that since there are an infinite amount of numbers that could be scribbled on this sheet (which, of course, the ink in a pen is made of atoms, so this is not possible but I will not do in depth on this) there are an infinite number of variables. Ah, but only one number will be written on the sheet, so there is only one agent influencing the person’s decision. The range of numbers that could be written has no influence, it is merely the certain number written that acts on that person’s decision – and again, there are a limited amount of atoms in the Universe, so there is a limited amount of influence on free will. We then get back into the capacity of the human mind. He incorrectly states: “Pro seems to think that a human brain must keep track of all of its influences, this is an invalid assumption.” No. The human brain does not have to keep conscious track of its influences – but it still has a limited amount of information that can be stored. Consciously or subconsciously influenced, the human mind cannot handle an infinite range of influence on free will. Conclusion My opponent states: “yet to provide any evidence that humans do indeed have the ability to close wavefunctions.” Well, read my first section, as well as sources 3 and 4. Human observation is what causes wavefunction collapse. References 1. http://dictionary.reference.com... 2. http://dictionary.reference.com... 3. http://goo.gl... 4. http://www.generativescience.org...