How Free Are You?
The Determinism Problem

Author: Ted Honderich

Second Edition, Oxford University Press, 2002

The question Ted Honderich asks is whether the question of free will is still worth addressing. He answers his question by reducing choice to a "psychoneural" event. He claims that the latest understanding of the human brain allows him to conclude that choice is not free, it is determined. 

What escapes Honderich is that taking the determinism position requires total knowledge, a total knowledge of all factors that are supposed to crowd out choice or will as a player in human decision making. 

Honderich is guilty of reductionism, but I forgive him. From reading his book I conclude that his brain made him do it. 

Copyright © 2010 Frank E. Smitha. All rights reserved.