Ok, about to let the cat out of the bag for the self deceived, if someone does not like what they hear, too bad, reality is reality. Thing is, we can argue forever on the issue of a supreme being, but the issue of free will is not something to be argued, since the realm of science has nailed it down. I think the only way one can argue about this would be the result not of a opposing opinion, but of a gross misunderstanding of the issue altogether.
Everyone is a victim not of genes, but of genes and enviornment together; knobs and turnings. Of course, you can argue with the preposition that all we are is knobs and turnings, genes and enviornment. You can insist that there's something......something more. But if you try to visualze the form this something would take, or articulate it clearly, you'll find the task impossible, for any force that in not in the genes or the enviornment is outside of physical reality as we perceive it.
Darwin sheads some light on this topic...... Darwin saw how these forces have their combined effect: by determining a person's physical "organization" which in turn determines thought and feeling and behavior. Darwin makes a point that even today goes ungrasped: ALL influences on human behavior, enviornmental as well as hereditary, are mediated biologically. Whatever combination of things has given your brain the exact physical organization it has at this moment( including your genes, your early enviornment, and your assimilation of the first half of this sentence), that physical organization is what determines how you will respond to the second half of this sentence.
As for why , if all behavior is determined, we "feel" as if we're making free choices, Darwin had a modern explanation....: our concious mind isnt privy to all the motivating forces. "The general delusion about free will is obvious- because man has power of action, and he can seldom analyze his motives (originally mostly INSTINCTIVE, and therefore now great effort of reason to discover them: this is important explanation) he thinks they have none."
Some of our motives are hidden from us not incidentally but by design, so that we can credibly act as if they aren't what they are; that, more generally, the "delusion about free will" may be an adaption. Still he got the basic idea: free will is an illusion, brought to us by evolution. All the things commonly blamed or praised for- are the result not of choices made by some immaterial "I" but of physical necessity.
A response to dehumanizing human behavior is what Darwin thought- complete surrender. Give up on free will; no one really deserves blame or credit for anything; we are all slaves of biology. "we must view a wicked man, like a sickly one, it would be more proper to pity than to hate and be disgusted." The hatred and revulsion that send people to jail- and in other contexts lead to arguements, fights, and wars- are without intellectual foundation. Of course they may have a PRACTICAL foundation. Indeed thats the problem: blame and punishment are as practically necessary as they are intellectually vacuous.
So the funny thing is that us "scientifically minded" people are more understanding and thus compassionate to others due to understanding the extends to which they acted. Theists will many times want to look down upon people as if they were somehow removed from the influences that make humans...... humans. Truth is; we are all of a robotic nature and by understanding this concept we can progress instead of blaming people for acts that were ultimately out of their control. This doesnt mean that punishment isnt a good deterant, because it is necessary to hold society together.
Free will= delusion.
People= robots.
