From Adrian Bowyer
If our unconscious really makes our decisions and we can track that process neuroscientifically, then are we responsible for our actions (18 July, p 5 and p 26)? If a person isn’t responsible for a crime because it’s not under their conscious control, then for the same reason the police, judge and jury are not responsible for the subsequent actions that they take against the criminal. Either individuals are responsible for what they do and the people who make up the legal system are responsible as well, or nobody is. The end result is the same, so although the question seems superficially important, it isn’t.
The only logically untenable positions are to maintain that individuals are not responsible and that magically groups of people are; or vice versa.
Foxham, Wiltshire, UK
