Why you don't really have free will
Jerry A. Coyne
1 Jan 2012
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/story/2012-01-01/free-will-science-religion/52317624/1Perhaps you've chosen to read this essay after scanning other articles on this website. Or, if you're in a hotel, maybe you've decided what to order for breakfast, or what clothes you'll wear today.
You haven't. You may
feel like you've made choices, but in reality your decision...
...Psychologists and neuroscientists are also showing that the experience of will itself could be an
illusion that evolution has given us
to connect our thoughts, which stem from unconscious processes, and our actions, which also stem from unconscious process. We think this because our sense of "willing" an act can be changed, created, or even eliminated through brain stimulation, mental illness, or psychological experiments. ...
...Evangelical Christians, for instance, believe that those who don't freely choose Jesus as their savior will go to hell. If we have no free choice, then such religious tenets — and the existence of a disembodied "soul" — are undermined, and any post-mortem fates of the faithful are determined, Calvinistically, by circumstances over which they have no control. ...
...things like
consciousness,
free choice, and even the idea of "
me" are but convincing
illusions fashioned by natural selection. ...
Alex's comment:
沒有「自由意志」，沒有「我」，沒有「決志信主」
最新的神經科學（neuroscience）研究顯示，「自由意志」並不存在。我們一直以為自己日日在意識地作各種的選擇。但原來這些「選擇」是大腦神經系統在意識層面之下早已做好定案，意識的「我」只是在定案已做好
之後，在最後一刻才被
知會。這個意識的「我」實在沒有，亦沒有權，作任何選擇。「我」被知會的時候，定案（我們以為的「選擇」）已不能更改。
如果沒有「自由意志」，沒有意識中的「選擇」，基督教褔音派中的所謂「決志信主」便只是自欺欺人的錯覺，因為那個「志」實在不是由我去「決」的。說「信」或「不信」的，是我大腦內的神經元（細胞），我阻止不了，我無權阻止。或者可以這樣說，如果「不信」的應被送落地獄（或「信」的上天堂），要被送的，應該是神經元，而非我，因為「信」與「不信」，是神經元們的選擇，不是我的選擇。沒有「自由意志」，整個基督教褔音派佈道工業便失去理論基礎。到頭來，原來加爾文的「雙重預定論」（double predestination）是對的，人做基督徒上天堂或做非信徒落地獄是上帝早已安排好的，與人的意志抉擇無關！
你或者會覺得加爾文無稽可笑，我還是說別些認真的，真正具先見之明的，要數佛陀，他早於二千五百多年前已領悟到：無「我」，「我」只是幻影。
（有個問題：以上的文字，我以為是理性地寫的，但實在是神經元寫的，不是我寫的，我不能保證合理。對嗎？）
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