Misotheists often level a complaint about Christianity that there is no free will, sometimes indicating that God is a marionettist pulling our strings. When we sin, he punishes us even though it is not our fault. Admittedly, questions about free will have been debated by Christians for centuries.
When such shallow attempts at theology are made by atheists, they conveniently ignore the fact that in their worldview, free will is impossible. Materialists reject the existence of God, so everything — even morality — does not make sense.
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| Modified from image of train tracks merging, Unsplash / Cowboy Bob Sorensen |
A big problem here is that people do not understand the meaning of free will. We can make choices that are only consistent with our nature. In Life of Brian (a Monty Python movie that has a couple of good scenes but I cannot recommend), Stan of the People's Front of Judea says he wants to have babies. Judith affirmed that, even though a man cannot have babies, he has the right. (Prescient for 1979, innit?) Demand whatever, people are constrained by their nature.
The traditional materialist stance, one that neuroscientist Sam Harris, theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder, and evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne endorse — along with many thinkers past and present — is that in this universe there can’t be free will. Albert Einstein (1879–1955) expressed the basic view in a 1932 address to the Spinoza Society where he stated, ”Human beings, in their thinking, feeling and acting are not free agents but are as causally bound as the stars in their motion.”Now a debate seems to have started up again. From one corner we learn that free will could possibly exist, provided that it is materialized or, if you like “evolutionized.”
If you will, you can read the rest and ponder it at "Could Evolution Give Us Free Will?" The author is not a creationist.