Free Will

How to assess if free will we possess?
Some lend voice to unfettered choice,
Would separate will from any process,
And from nature untied, rejoice:

“Worldly connection does not induce
Unique human capacity to choose,
Cognition and rationality transduce,
And moral responsibility imbues.”

Supernatural self so defined
Is exception to nature’s flow,
With existence is not entwined.
How would reality, it ever know?

With any causal disconnect prescription,
Troubling random disorders introduce,
Lessens utility and proper ascription
To capacities our choices produce.

Some folks, options within nature fix,
For more choices to consider, select.
It’s orderly in natural causal matrix,
And choice, ownership does reflect.

For our choices within nature’s bounds,
Are very human, even if mistaken,
And caused, as circumstance surrounds,
By antecedent availabilities taken.

Capacities for cognition and rationality
Were caused by brain convolution,
Morally responsible choice capability
By social interaction and evolution.

Within one’s own daily choice purview,
We notice decisions made before,
Bear on what we can now do,
And what we can’t do any more.

Yes, free will’s contextual definition,
From the natural order does flow,
And applies to optional condition —
Of individuals, as we all should know.

We’ll take the naturalistic version
Of a not quite so free will,
Knowing it fits -- a recursion
Of choices as our lives we fill.