Free Will is Reasonable

The PSR, which Pro accepts, states that for anything that happens, there is a sufficient reason for why it happens. That means that given some set of circumstances, those circumstances are sufficient to explain why the next thing happened.Free will states just the opposite. It states that whatever the prior circumstances are, you could still choose one way or another. There are no prior circumstances that are sufficient to explain why you chose the way you did.Con's explanation for why one freely chooses A rather than B basically amounts to “Just because.” I chose A because that’s what I chose.Consider this conversation.Pro: I chose A.Con: Why did you choose A?Pro: Because I just did.Con: But why did you?Pro: Because that’s what I chose.Con: But why is that what you chose?Do you see what’s going on here? Con is not really supplying a sufficient explanation for why he chose A. Whenever he’s asked why he chose A, he states it as if it were just a brute fact. It’s just the way thing are. But brute facts are inconsistent with the PSR.Pro appears not to understand my jumping out from behind the couch analogy. The analogy is suppose to illustrate that if an event can occur when there’s nothing prior to that event that tells you the event is about to occur, then the event will be a surprise. If one has free will and can therefore act contrary all inclination from motives and desires that exist prior to the moment of choice, then the final choice can be just as much of a surprise to the one who does it as it would be if somebody jumped out from behind a couch.Pro says he’d be guiding the process during the choice. But what does that mean? To guide a process, one’s will must be engaged in the process. One must be acting on some desire, motive, or inclination. As long as you are doing something on purpose, your prior plans, intentions, motives, etc., are bringing about your actions. That’s what it means to be in control of your actions.But if one can act contrary to their own pre-existing desires, motives, etc., then one is not in control of their actions. Their actions arise spontaneously, apart from all antecedent conditions, including whatever antecedent conditions exist in their own heads. That means free will acts are accidents.Pro’s claim that he is “guiding” his actions is at odds with free will. One cannot guide their actions and have free will at the same time since free will acts are spontaneous accidents and guiding involves exerting ones will in accordance with one’s desires, motives, inclinations, plans, etc.Pro attempts to rescue morality by claiming that even under free will, one can act intentionally. The only way one could’ve chosen B instead of A is if they had a prior intention to choose B instead of A. But as long as you have any control over your action, your action must be determined by your intention. If you choose A rather than B, and you do it intentionally, then your intention determined your choice. If your intention determined your choice, then your choice could not have been otherwise. You can’t both intend and not intend to do the same action at the same time and in the same sense because that’s a contradiction. So whatever you intend, that’s what you do.And since intention determines your choice, your choice is not free in the sense that we have been discussing. So Pro has not rescued morality from free will.In the case of rationality, Pro claims that prior circumstances influence your beliefs, and this does not undermine free will. He’s right about that. Free will does allow for prior conditions to influence your choices and your beliefs. They just can’t determine your beliefs. That means you could’ve chosen otherwise. Your belief could’ve been otherwise.But think about this. Influence comes in greater or lesser degrees. The stronger evidence is, the closer it is to determining your belief because the stronger it is, the more influence it has over your belief.So free will comes in degrees. The weaker evidence is, the farther the evidence is from determining your belief, and the farther evidence is from determining your belief, the more free you are because the father evidence is from determining your belief, the less influence evidence has over your belief.And that’s the problem with free will. The better your reasons are for believing something, the less free you are to believe otherwise. So reasons and evidence diminish free will. Free will, on the other hand, diminishes the influence of reasons and evidences. You cannot have both.So which one makes you rational? Are you more rational the more free you are to act contrary to what the evidence suggests? Or are you more rational the more influence evidence has in bringing about your beliefs?Well, obviously we are rational to the degree that our beliefs are based on reasons and evidence. The more hand reason and evidence has in bringing about our beliefs, the more rational those beliefs are. The less hand reason and evidence has in bring about our beliefs, the less rational we are because the less hand reason and evidence has in bringing about our beliefs, the more arbitrary our beliefs are. It follows that we are most rational when reason and evidence determine our beliefs, and we are the least rational when we are most free, i.e. when reason and evidence has no influence over our beliefs at all.So free will undermines rationality. Since free will undermines rationality, it’s a self-refuting belief. One cannot be rational in holding to free will because free will undermines the necessary preconditions for rational thought. So it is irrational, and therefore unreasonable, to believe in free will.Thank you for coming, and thanks to Pro for the debate.