Determinism Vs Libertarianism

The debate regarding whether or not humans are ultimately responsible for their actions and decisions has grown rapidly in the twenty-first century, as this debate was mainly a theological and philosophical debate, rather than a scientific one, and mainly a debate restricted to experts and scholars. The two opposing theories which create such a debate are Libertarianism and Determinism. Libertarianism proposes the argument that free choice is true, and since it is true, complete causal determinism must be false and does not exist. This view accepts the psychological image and rejects the mechanistic image of one’s actions and decisions. The psychological image, also known as the ‘common sense view’ looks at the mind, feelings, and emotions,

hard determinism debate, specifically from a neuroscience perspective. Being able to obtain quantitative information whilst also observing the qualitative behaviour of the participants at the same time allows for experimenters to look at results being posted and seeing the participant simultaneously increases the understanding and accuracy in the conclusions. Having the ability to analyze an individual 's mental processes as well as behavioural impulses allows us to seek correlations within the field, and drawing conclusions as to how the articles read affected the participant. I feel as though the concluding thoughts made by the authors were correct, as I agree that belief in free will is beneficial to society. The belief in free will promotes the implementation of self control to overcome more selfish and impulsive behavior. Furthermore, scientific exposure to anti-free will information affects our brains on a cognitive and neural level. These claims are all true, because the results from the experiments prove that believing in free will can drive our behaviour. The concerns that I had with this experiment are how accurate RP is, and do the amplitudes and numerical values derived from it directly relate to one’s decision making? I would suggest as a modification to this experiment is placing a flashing light which would tell the participant when to press the button. What would be observed is how committed and forced those in the anti-free will group are when the light flashes, as pushing the button will be optional to all participants, and in the opposite case, observing whether the control group goes against the instruction. The use of an EEG will also be required as RP will also be measured. Seeing whether the article’s influence affects the control group and anti-free will group with regards to their decision making will present us with a more accurate idea as to how