My basic issue with the idea of 'choice' iis that we act as if a choice is inside a bubble seperate from the person making the so-called 'choice'.  As if there aren't a million variables affecting the 'choice' that is made - many of which are a product of our 'design' should you believe we are in fact a created being.  So - if we are designed my ultimate issue is how can we exempt God from ALL responsibility for what His creations do?  We dont do that with car manufacturers?  Someday when we have self-driving vehicles will we say the car itself is responsible for the death of its passengers or will we seek out what the creator of that vehicle may have messed up in the hardware or software?  Anywho - kkinda irks me when religious types completely bypass the issue of God's accountability by laying it on the altar of free will.,(reply>), @The Word I agree...the main reason we are focused on the wrong areas regarding human behavior is simply because we can't see the root causes.  We can't address the root causes cause we can't measure, accurately define them or see them.  It's similar problem to consciousness itself.  I believe most, if not all, of who we are is baked in the cake from some beginning.  A bad person with destructive desires is probably "baked" that way.  And a good person with positive desires is likely the same.  I think our brains are mere conduits for the conscious entities that exist beyond our physically observable realm.  Perhaps those conscious entities working through us have free will options that are encoded into our behavior, especially regarding those behaviors/desires that lie outside the norms.,(reply>), @Kenjoneslee Indeed, in my thoughts the clinging to an all or nothing conception of 'free will' pushed mainly by religion (by necessity to maintain the idea that God can do no wrong) is actually harmful to humanity.  It basically means that we treat an engineering problem as a set of personal problems.  <br><br>To use my former example - it is as if instead of looking at what went wrong with the vehicle's hardware and/or software or even environmental factors, we do NOTHING to aaddress the root cause of the problem and simply 'punish' the vehicle for making bad 'choices'.<br><br>This mentality has the effect ofwasting countless lives, energy and time in a never-ending cycle of punishment rather than actually creating societies that organicalkly produce peopel who are less likely to committ evil acts.  <br><br>I don't believe humanity can ever be perfect - I am not a utopian. That said I do not consider the word utopia to be a bad word.  We should be striving towards utopiuan futures while at the same time understanding that the goal may never be reached but the ball can be moved forward if we simply embrace the idea that there are certain basic things that are within our control as a species in terms of how we work because those things are part of our 'design'.,(reply>), I agree....we are far less than 100% accountable for what we are, say and do as "created" conscious beings.  The creator must bare some, if not most, of the responsibility.   This is why I don't believe in eternal punishment or rewards.