Scott Adams can write
He just can. Many have said it before and I too had glimpsed at it from time to time at his Dilbert blog, but I just read (via 2centsworth) The Little Robot That Could post — a thought experiment against the idea of freewill — and have to say it again: he’s funny, he gets the message across, he’s unassumingly challenging, he’s imaginative, he risks, he’s enticingly (yet humbly) pretentious, he delivers, he’s faithful ELZR, he conveys, he makes you think — he can write.
Of all the controversial topics I’ve raised on this blog, free will is the one that seems to most grab people by the nuts and/or teats and twirl them around. I understand why. Belief in free will is the reboot button for civilization. Don’t read any further until you have saved your applications.
Today I offer a new approach to understanding why you don’t have free will. I call it The Little Robot That Could. I will show that a robot, designed with current technology, could exhibit everything you call free will. Once you accept that the robot has every bit of “choice” that you have in this world, your superstition about your own choices will begin to dissolve. That process will take about a month.