Okay okay, no Dr. Pepper.

Here are my top 5 reasons for determinism, or at least my top 5 reasons against free will as most people see it. Probably not very well argued and certainly not comprehensive, because it’s 4 in the morning and I just ate a metric ton of M&Ms and am bouncing off the walls. From “least powerful” to “most powerful.”

Have fun.

“Choice” doesn’t really exist
I know this point is probably splitting hairs, but it’s a point that I think should be made. We can’t not “choose.” We may assume we’re in control of what we decide to do, but in truth, we’re not. Suppose I had an apple and an orange, and I got to pick which one I wanted. Even if I were to say, “I don’t like apples or oranges, so I’m not going to pick one,” I would still be making the choice not to choose between two options presented outside of my control. The choice not to choose is in our control, but it’s still a choice.

We are constrained and ultimately directed by our desires
I think we like to believe we have free will because we assume that we can choose to follow our desires or not. Suppose I had to choose between eating a crap ton of M&Ms (obviously the choice I want) or going to the rec center. If I chose the M&Ms, I would be choosing in the favor of my desire. But if I chose the rec center instead, I would be going against my desires, thus showing I could choose against what I want, right?
I don’t think so. The extent of our control over our desires lies only in the psychological realm, I think. I don’t believe we can ultimately choose pain over pleasure, even if, in the short run, what we’re choosing appears to be pain. I hate going to the rec center and think it’s boring. So why would I ever choose to do it? Because after I’m done, I feel better. Even people who do stuff that are “painful” or “not desirable” as characterized by the majority of people do so because, for some reason or another, the activities are desirable to themselves. I think, with any choice we make, we can find some positive link to a desire.

True free will would “eliminate” this desire
Okay, so what if you still think we have free will despite this element of desire? I’ve talked to some people (I talk about this a LOT, trust me) who have said that free will is the absence of any sway or any outside force influencing your decisions (like for example, one guy mentioned God’s influence). Well, wouldn’t that just put everything onto a level playing field, then? I would think it would be impossible to get anything done if we weren’t swayed by any influence outside of our own mind. “Do I wash the car or do I kill the president? DO I WASH THE CAR OR DO I KILL THE PRESIDENT?!?”

Parsimony
It seems like the inclusion of free will eliminates a portion of the parsimony of universal laws that can be retained if the same phenomena can be explained using determinism. That is, I think that determinism retains a simplicity that is lost when free will is added to the mix. I believe that our choices and actions in our world can be explained just as well with determinism as they can with free will. If this is so, then a universe with determinism included in its model rather than free will is a more parsimonious universe.

Finally…

Materialism lends itself to determinism
I’m a materialist, which basically means that I think that all of consciousness arises solely out of the biological functionings of the brain and has nothing to do with any sort of “outside” source like a soul. The biological processes of the brain, of course, involve various chemical and electrical interactions. I think processes like these—things going down on an atomic level—are essentially governed by causation. Positive and negative charges influence sodium-potassium gates, if I can remember back to Bio 102 (sorry if I’m wrong, Matt). I think these causal influences, if we take materialism as our assumption and assume that consciousness arises out of purely biological mechanisms, can run all the way up the chain. That is, causal processes at the atomic level = causal processes at the level of the whole consciousness. To me, that just makes sense.