Stephen Has NO CLUE About Neuroscience & Free Will

The claim that neuroscience has debunked free will has become fairly widespread and Rationality Rules, one of the most prominent atheist YouTubers, is at the forefront preaching this exact message. He proclaims that “science is telling us loud and clear and unequivocally that while our feelings of free will are real free will itself is an illusion.” His case is based on what are arguable the two most often-cited studies in neuroscience which presumably showed that determinism is true and free will doesn’t exist (which means that by watching my video you’ll not only get to see my response to @rationalityrules but you’ll learn about the nuts and bolts that are behind the popular claim that neuroscience has debunked free will). The first one is the work of Benjamin Libet, a pioneering neuroscientist who published a groundbreaking study in the early 1980s. The second one is the work of Chun Siong Soon. This video is part #1 of my response to Stephen’s case (part #2 will follow later) and it deals exclusively with Stephen’s treatment of Libet’s work. One of the most eye-opening lessons you will learn is that Benjamin Libet himself never thought of his work as providing evidence for determinism and against free will. Quite the opposite, actually. This means that Rationality Rules has essentially hijacked and abused Libet’s work for a case that Libet himself would never have supported. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg… I hope you will enjoy this video which deals with a key theme in Christian apologetics and in debates between skeptics and Christians.

For most of my criticism, I follow Albert R. Mele’s work “Free: Why Science Hasn’t Disproved Free Will” (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014).

A big THANK YOU to my friend Dan Miller who helped me a great deal to think carefully about the issues pertaining to free will and determinism.

0:00 Intro & Disclaimers
2:37 Libet's Study
6:01 Problem #1: Libet vs Stephen
8:44 Problem #2: Random vs Non-random Decisions
12:11 Problem #3: 50% Data Missing!
15:56 Preview

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[Deflate]

I’d like to reiterate what I’ve mentioned in my previous responses to @Rationality Rules: I greatly enjoy Stephen’s content and I have learned a lot from him. He was the very first atheist YouTuber I discovered and started to follow back in the days. While I disagree with him about almost everything it seems, I have nothing but respect and appreciation for him as a person. I believe he is honest in his intellectual pursuit and I admire him for the sheer breadth of topics he has been covering over the past years. He has helped a lot of people to think critically about religion and has accomplished a lot even as he seems to have faced quite some challenges. I find that remarkable. I also believe that Christians in particular can learn a lot from engaging with his material. Thus, none of what I mention here is meant as a personal attack against him. Instead, everything I say is aimed at the case he has built. As I said, I’ve expressed my appreciation for Stephen in previous videos. However, l simply wanted to reiterate this here again as I’m aware that some commenters will probably try to criticize me for supposedly attacking Stephen.

[CaliforniaKevman]

"Please believe me!" begged the determinist.

[Philo-uluq]

I had no choice but to love this video.

From a Biophysicist/Neuroscientist in training, you have earned my respect.

[SimplifiedTruth]

Questioning freewill only makes sense if you have it.

[theautodidacticlayman]

UN-DER-RA-TED!! Dude, so many people should be hearing what you have to say. What a methodically thorough analysis.

[jonrendell]

If you believe you have free will, choose to like something that you do not like.

[yndsu]

I definitely was determined to click on this video. Been waiting for it since you said you were going to publish it 😁

[Seeker]

There is no moral dictation if there is no free will.

[Astropeleki]

To the determinists in the comments: does it make sense for anyone to be outraged by immoral acts like a genocide if the perpetrators are not freely choosing to commit it?

Because if a Nazi is free to despise someone for not being Aryan, I can blame him for it. If it's just a consequence of their environment, biology etc. then any outrage is meaningless.

Isn't it?

[adamcolejones]

Many Christians known as Calvinists also do not believe in free will. They read certain chapters of Romans without the Old Testament citations.

If we don’t have free will, every emotion we feel towards evil and sin is arbitrary.

[TheJesster]

This is a really solid video. I'm interested to (hopefully) see Stephen's response!

[juanmanuelgonzalez]

Oh man this was such a fun video to watch. Pls share more often

[terrifictomm]

"So you're saying there're no things as absolutes?" I asked my first-year sociology professor who was actually a philosopher.

"Absolutely, " he unironically replied, contributing another tidbit to my lifelong contempt for American higher education.

[young_dan_kee]

Awesome how he says “while I was originally determined to make one video, I later decided to split it into three”. This cleverness did not go unnoticed!

[beyondwoke]

The irony of modern ‘science’ is that Woodford had to use his free will to ‘debunk’ free will!

[retouchbystrength]

This is an amazing body if work! I watched a video on “the illusion of free will” a while back and it bothered me though I didn’t have enough to respond to it! I even had a discussion with a friend on this topic and it was very polarizing! But after watching your video, You’ve totally debunked this nonsense and I thank you for that!

[lindseykathryn]

Why does Steven need to leave out so much information to make his "argument". Why would humans feel the need to make decisions, even agonize over the "right decisions" if there aren't really any decisions to make?

[Giant_Meteor]

The experiment shows only a lapse in time between the initiation of a subject's act to flex, and the awareness that he had initiated that action, nothing more than this. It has little or no bearing on the question of free will vs. Determinism.
The whole experiment is predicated on the subject having initiated the action at his own discretion. It says nothing in regard to whether the subject's initial readiness potential at each instance could have occurred other than it did (at a different moment, with a different degree of force, etc.), or as Deflate points out, that at all the moments in between in which the subject did not bother to flex, that he could not have done otherwise.

[boguslav]

The liber study has an issue... One had to make a decision to flex and also be aware of the moment that this happen ed. This means that sny lag time is expect ed because you need to come to a spontaneous decision and take note of having come to that decision seperate ly and afterwards. The issue here is that asking someone when they were aware is like asking someone what they ate this morning. Its woefully imprecise and often holds to delay.

Generally there was build up, but nothing that disproves a mind in fact one can consider this a translation al period from mind to execution.

[oisinofthefianna]

Yor mention of "free won't" reminded me of a study I read years ago about the best hitters in Major League Baseball.
It was found the ball was coming at the batter at such a high rate of speed the batter did not have time to make a Yes/No decision.
Instead, the best hitters went to the plate assuming they would swing at every pitch, they then just decided No.
Very good video.