(taken from http://www.vexen.co.uk/3/hf.html )

"An argument against Free Will can be constructed by considering causality. Causality is the way that all events are caused by previous events. Causality is most easily demonstrateable for stable, small systems where it is easy to manipulate things and measure things precisely. Causality also means that all the choices we made have been caused by other factors.

The activity of a persons brain can be monitored and (with carefully placed electrodes) controlled. In experiments on cats a small electrode can be placed on the red nucleus in the brain (a small part of the medulla) and when activated, the cat will immediately curl up and go to sleep.

In Human Beings most experiments have been on the Cerebral Hemispheres and Frontal Lobes, which are the memory and major character storage respectively. Stimulating parts of the Cerebral Hemispheres will immediately cause the person to recall certain memories (sometimes ones that they had forgotten), and operating on the Frontal Lobes radically changes people's emotions and behaviour.
Slowly removing a persons brain slowly takes away their consciousness, and even a brief study of various neuronal diseased can show how related the two are.
Cause and effect penetrate through our very consciousness and thought procedures. With quiet introspection and meditation you can reach the following realisation:

A living being never truly makes a choice. We only become aware of such things after we have made them.

When I want to make a choice, my consciousness picks up, observes, and passes information around via the Limbic System. I can't make choices before I know what the options are, but when I know what the options are my brain makes the choice for me. We are in this sense, observers of ourselves observing our realities."

This next part, kinda reinforces my arguemnet that we have very limited choices:
(taken from same)

"1. "Choices" exist, so behaviour can be influenced by justice and morals.
A person is free to act if they can choose between options. If this choice exists, they have freedom to choose. This is what freedom is. Once a person makes that choice, they will suffer the good, bad or neutral consequences of their choice. This is justice as it should be.
Law and society chooses to impose rules, so that when it's members choose certain actions they are punished, because they chose an option that was bad for the collective good.

Determinism does not change any of this. It means that the person is still free to choose between the choices that he had, but also that his choice is a result of a milliard of factors and processes, a result of natural events. We all know that such events affect the way we make choices, and no one thinks that this undermines our morals in any way.

"The preceding doctrines about necessity and freedom do not undermine morality, but rather are absolutely essential to its support. Everyone, even when they are moralizing, assumes that behavior is all caused, and that predictions about behavior can be made. The legal system uses rewards and punishments. These make sense only if they have a regular and uniform influence, to produce the desired results. That is, the legal system rests on the presumption that behavior is caused."
http://www.ptproject.ilstu.edu/pt/fwdthu.htm

Quote ends.

This fortifies my theory that we have no choice.
The author talks about the same restrictions placed upon us by many factors - belief systems, upbringing, and conscious awareness - as I do (but somewhat more eloquently lol).

As a side-line, this link (http://www.matrix-explained.com/php/...ic.php?p=10215) explains the conclusion of the Matrix - and also, rather intrestingly, points out the human 'obsession' with the notion of choice

hehehe..I really love this discussion - even if it has wandered slightly from the original mission lmaooo...but, I guess that we sometimes have to go about things in a long-winded way, so that we can explore our theories to the nth degree

Res...