The thesis deals with current interdisciplinary issues that arise at the intersection of philosophy, neuroscience and criminal law. Although traditional philosophical debates have questioned the claim that humans have free will, the current paradigm has also started to include neuroscientific findings which, according to some, suggest that humans are causally predetermined and thus do not have free will.
This paper places these neuroscientific findings in the context of the traditional arguments of the theories of free will, hard determinism and compatibilism, and explores questions of the relevance of neuroscientific findings on free will for criminal law.
From an internal (doctrinal) perspective, certain neuroscientific insights into free will can inform the Slovenian criminal law standard of voluntariness of conduct by providing insights into the state of consciousness (in certain states such as somnambulism) at the time of the commission of the offence, and how it influences the conduct or the criteria for criminal responsibility
From an external (normative) perspective, neuroscientific insights are important in particular in terms of changing people's intuitions about the justification of punishment. A more and more detailed understanding of the brain processes that lead to the manifestation of behaviour can undermine the intuitive perception of the justification of retributive punishment, since neuroscience, through the justification of the existence of determinism, can present persons as mere victims of circumstances that do not allow them the freedom to act differently. This can lead to changes in the criminal justice system, since the justification of retributive punishment would no longer seem justified in such a situation.
|
