How to Find Free Will in the Brain: Re-imagining the Causal Bottleneck

Eddy Nahmias | Georgia State University

Thursday, August 6 | 5:30pm doors for a 5:45pm start

Does discovering that our decisions happen entirely in the brain, and are fully caused by prior events, threaten free will? Some scientists, such as Robert Sapolsky (Determined 2023), think so. I argue for a different response to such discoveries. I argue that causal control of our decisions depends on which of their prior causes most precisely and robustly control the decisions. By this measure of causal control, the source of our decisions lies not in prior causes or physical levels beyond our control, but in the deliberating brain itself. This view of free will fits with our ordinary sense of agency, and it provides responses to challenges to free will from determinism and reductionism. At the same time, this view offers a more scientifically tractable and useful foundation for questions about moral and legal responsibility. When we focus on the causal bottleneck that is the brain, we can explain how free will works rather than explaining it away.

Please join us for some refreshments in Sounds Cafe after the talk.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER:

Eddy Nahmias is Professor of Philosophy and Neuroscience at Georgia State University. He works on topics in philosophy of mind, moral psychology, and experimental philosophy, with a primary focus on debates about free will, moral responsibility, and punishment. His recent interests include ethical and psychological questions raised by emerging A.I. and teaching and coaching college and high school Ethics Bowl teams. He is author of numerous articles and chapters in these areas and co-edited Moral Psychology: Historical and Contemporary Readings (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) and The Natural Method: Essays on Mind, Ethics, and Self in Honor of Owen Flanagan (MIT Press, 2020).

ABOUT THE KENNETH MEREDITH GARVEN LECTURSHIP

The Garven Lecture on Free Will is funded by a bequest from Kenneth. Meredith Garven, and aims to promote discussion of free will in a modern scientific context, focussing on issues pertaining to contemporary physics and determinism, and contemporary biology and choice.

Image by Eddy Nahmias and Stockcake.

Contact the host of 2026 Kenneth Meredith Garven Lecture

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