Free will probably exists in humans.

Why is something living any different than something nonliving?..." Yes, free will doesn't really exist in viruses. I already said that I don't know where in living beings the line is drawn for free will and not free will. I'm guessing that everything that is an animal has some free will. "Why should free will be possible in living beings? Last I checked, living beings are still made of elementary particles." Yes, but they can think, which is something that non-living things can't do. A rock doesn't have the ability to think. Animals have the ability to think. Humans have the ability to postulate. "The first cause is a single event, and there can only be one effect. If there's more than one effect, they become predictable. If there are effects caused by the first effect, they also become predictable since they are not derived from a first cause, and are instead derived from the effect of a first cause." Ah, but your mind is capable of creating secondary causes, which are things you decide that are somewhat influenced by your surroundings, which is free will. I can read Great Expectations, OR I can read America Alone, and it is my decisions, and both of those choices will have different effects on the rest of my life. "I think we need to define random. Random: Randomness is a lack of order, purpose, cause, or predictability. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Random If the prediction doesn't come true, then it's random. Free will cannot be simply random. Randomness is not freedom." Just because something can't be predicted by others doesn't mean that it wasn't the person's choice, though. Let's say that free will does in fact exist. That means that I can't predict what my friend will do, because he makes his own choices, and I don't know them. That is how free will can coincide with "randomness." "But was it a choice from free will? Free will is not necessary for a choice, only for a free choice. (My previous definition of 'choice' was inadequate; I meant 'free choice' or 'choice from free will'.) For example, computer programs make choices all the time. If I write an if/then statement into a computer program and then give it input, it makes a choice: it selects a course of action. It does not freely select a course of action, though." Ah, but my mind is not a computer program, and if it is, I am the one who programmed it, after it was created, and thus, it does what I want it to, so I still have free will. "No matter how much evidence my opponent provides, my opponent must counter my logical proof. Evidence, while frequently being enough, is not absolute. Logic is absolute. A logical proof overrides all other forms of proof. My opponent must counter my proof." I thought that that was what I was overthrowing. "I was not saying that the video was an argument. I was saying where I got my argument from. And yes, my logic is not exactly the same as the logic in the video. My logic for this point currently stands unrefuted." Well, you made the video part of your argument, and so I countered it. And by now, it is unclear exactly what piece of logic to mean to be yours, as there are several that I have refuted, and I don't know which one wasn't good enough. Please be clearer as to your wants. "They were not expected, but that doesn't mean they were not expectable. With enough information, it is possible that the seemingly unusual choices could have been predicted. For example, if the sun suddenly exploded, it would be unexpected. We -- besides being dead -- would have no idea what caused it. But we would still assume that there was a cause, since we generally don't see things happen without a cause." Well, of course there is a cause, but maybe the cause was something that somebody thought. There is obviously a limited number of possible outcomes, and you could identify what could happen, but the event that DOES happen is up to free will. "I was aware of this quote, but did not think it important, because of the sentence that directly follows: 'Despite the differences in the exact numerical value, however, the main finding has held.'" Oh. So, in a random test, where a person needs to pick a random time, he lets the subconscious take over. However, this doesn't really apply to real, important decisions, such as which car to buy, or which college to go to, or whether to play golf or do chores. "Baggins in the comment section has pointed out to me that the judges are possibly biased. The idea of not having free will is scary. Even I agree with that. But we cannot avoid the truth simply because we don't like it. I ask the judges to ensure that they vote in an unbiased manner. Remember my argument in round two, about why even if free will doesn't exist, we might as well act as though it does." Agreed. I hate bias. "Everything is either caused by something else, or is unpredictable and therefore random." About your quote, just because past experience has a large impact on what you do, doesn't mean that you don't still have a final say. You make the final decision, no matter what the facts are. "To refute my main argument, my opponent must either prove that there is some third option or that cause and effect do not work in the way we think, and instead work in a way that allows for free will. Until one of these criteria is filled, free will is proven impossible and the vote goes to CON." Okay, then. There was a first cause, caused by a divine being triggering the universe, and the divine being had free will. Then, when he created life, each of those beings had their own ability to make choices in their lives, although their situation has an impact on their decisions. Ultimately, though, they have a limited free will, which is free will. "1. Desires must come from somewhere. So either there is an infinite regress, or the ultimate source of desire is external." You still have the free will of whether to go with your desires or not. "2. What we think is free will is frequently our subconscious mind making the decision before our conscious mind does." This can be applied to random decisions, but has yet to be applied to something like a math test or personality test, in which the answers are not random. "This is Nietzsche's argument against free will, from http://plato.stanford.edu... For a human's free will to truly be free, it must be caused by nothing; if it had a cause, it would be predictable. Therefore, it must be its own cause or have no cause. But humans are not their own cause, so where does their free will come from? Nowhere? That not only doesn't make sense, but is randomness and therefore not free will." Your definition of free will said that all that is required is the ability to think to make a choice, and your further definition said that it must not be "wholly determined by external conditions." This allows for free will to be influenced by one's life and still be free will. "Given this evidence and the proofs that I have provided, free will cannot exist. I have offered three logical proofs and some empirical evidence. If one of my proofs stands unrefuted by the end of this debate, then I have proven that free will does not exist. Vote CON!" I have countered my opponent's logical proofs to the best of my ability. I may have succeeded; I may have not. It depends on who reads the debate. I encourage all votes to exercise their free will by reading this debate, then considering this debate, and coming up with their own votes largely influenced by the debate. Although, I would prefer a PRO vote. :) Thank you for this wonderful debate.