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User: Bullefant

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  1. Dennet: Freedom Evolves on Do Subatomic Particles Have Free Will? · · Score: 1
    This is exactly the main point in D. Dennet's "Freedom Evolves". His argument (if a book in philosophy can be summarized in a few bullet points):
    • Even in a strictly deterministic world (like Conway's Game of Life) you can design "avoiders"
    • These simple creatures and their universe is 100% deterministic, but still they are best described by referring to things like their "senses", "defenses" and "self-preservation".
    • Even if the universe is 100% deterministic at the atomic level, natural selection favors organisms that collect information about the world and react to it
    • determinism and an evolved sense of free will may very well co-exist. In fact, the evolution of a brain that thinks that it's a free agent would not happen in a non-deterministic universe.