Free will exists

At the outset I will address an issue raised in the Comments section. It is there suggested that my definition (although agreed to by my opponent) of "brain" is open to scientific attack. Just briefly, wikipedia contains the following: "The brain is the physical and biological matter contained within the skull, responsible for electrochemical neuronal processes" (. http://en.wikipedia.org...). I trust this goes some way to vindicate my definition. My opponent claims that free will exists. He bases this on the proposition that he can stop typing whenever he wishes. I do not disagree with that. Except to say that the very act of "wishing" is not in itself a voluntary process. I will now attempt to explain why. The action of "wishing" is a species of "thought". It is in effect a decision made by an individual. The decision results from a thought process. The thought process (as stipulated in the assumption for this debate) takes part in the brain. It results from a very complex combination of electrical and chemical neuronal processes. You do not consciously control those processes. The brain processes information in accordance with the laws of physics (althought there is still much we do not understand about the fine details of these processes). Since every thought is simply the result of a physical process taking place in the brain, the very act of "wishing" is in itself not controllable by the individual's conscious thinking. Rather, his conscious awareness of the wish comes about after the wish is already made. Looked at it from this perspective, the brain is basically a very very complex computer. The human body in itself is nothing more than an extremely complex machine. All of my opponent's actions and reactions, moves and thoughts are dictated by the physical makeup of his brain, the chemical composition of each part of his body, the connections of his neurons, external stimuli and how his brain is programmed to react to external stimuli. If it were possible to recognise, analyse and undestand all of these factors and precisely how they come to play in my opponent's thinking processes then every one of his thoughts and actions could be predicted with perfect accuracy. Of course that is impossible due to the enormously huge number of factors at play. My opponent is likely to say that when he is confronted with two or more options (generated by this physical process in his brain), he freely elects which one to choose. Well, again, the process of choosing an option is in itself just a combination of electro-chemical neuronal processes. Take a break for just one second and consider this question: Do you control your thoughts? Where do they come from? If you think about this carefully, you will very quickly realise that you do not dictate to your brain what it is going to think. Rather, the brain dictates your thoughts to you. My opponent is now likely to say "yes, but your brain IS you". Well, true. But it is not the "conscious you". The conscious you is simply a manifestation of a huge number of processes that take place completely outside your control and knowledge. I am sorry to break this to my opponent but he is just a robot.