You story is directly controverting your position. We know that decision-making happens at a subconscious level (choice). Your conscious merely acts in accordance with the decision like a dog to its master.

Your conscious takes in data from the external world, and then follows orders from your subconscious. That's the only function.

That literally reads like nothing. It is a proven fact that animals don't have sense of morality, character, appreciation of beauty and art, sense of humor and so on despite having a complex brains. Just observe the wild life how it that not provable? you didn't answer any of my question about the complexity. Then you refer to some " published science" without actually discussing the ideas....  Huh.

I think it is safe to say this is the best time to end this empty cycle. I enjoyed the topic, especially Rol's posts

In the first place I wasn't even talking to you okay.. You just injected yourself.. You know the guy that comes over when you're talking to someone else and stands around until he can join the conversation? FYI, this little chitchat we had was just me not being rude to ignore you. There you have it.

This is simply not true. Animals has shown a sense of humour, appreciation of beauty, sadness, love and even a sense of right and wrong. We have been able to learn apes sign language and communicate with them, (and they've expressed emotions in these conversations). There is a lot less separating animals and humans than you think. We aren't some unique species, 99% of our DNA is shared with chimpanzees.

I was trying to get to the end of the topic first, but I guess I lack the willpower :p
Animals do appear to have morality, character, appreciation of beauty and humor. And I'm pretty sure my dog is concious and self-aware.

The idea that animals can appreciate comedy isn’t as far-fetched as it sounds, considering some of the other groundbreaking discoveries scientists like Bekoff are making about animal behavior: They have found dogs that understand unfairness, spiders that display different temperaments, and bees that can be trained to be pessimistic.
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/features/2014/the_humor_code/do_animals_have_a_sense_of_humor_new_evidence_suggests_that_all_mammals.html
https://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Lives-Animals-Scientist-Explores/dp/1577316290?ie=UTF8&tag=slatmaga-20

The can even make art


Humans aren't that special. Heck Dolphins might be laughing at us all the time. Look at them running around all day all stressed :)

Yes, and those reactions get weeded out by natural selection (if it leads to fatalism and unwillingness to procreate)
Happiness, cheerfulness are attractive qualities in a mate. Fatalism, sitting around because it all doesn't matter anyway is a dead end.

Believing in free will apparently makes life easier. The brain has tons of ways to trick itself, free will might simply be another mechanism to get on with daily business. If I had free will I would will my current headache away.

I appreciate your willpower, so I'm going to reply one more time to clear things up XD

I think it is important to notify that I specifically said to him to "observe the wild life" of the animals. Because that is where it evolve fundamentally different than our way of life. That where the difference shows. I'm fully aware that with human interference animals can simulate some aspects of our behavior when trained or put under strict and repeated situations. It is the memory and the ability to recall that get in the mix here. But that is really not even the main argument. 

This whole argument started by stating how the human brain is special and more complex than other animals, and I wanted to know how... even though humans don't have the biggest brains, not the biggest brian to body ratio. And not even the most neurons which transmitting the impulses. Human brain isn't that special indeed. But what we can achieve with it surely is. 

I am surprised that not one single person here knows much about modern physics. It was known during the time of Einstein that physics is not predetermined and the study of that is quantum mechanics. You can look it up but it basically means that the motion of atoms can not be predicted and any regularities are a statistical bulk phenomenon that we can get approximations to, but never certainties. That is our basic understanding of physics today and one of the problems we have is that there is no theory that combines Einstein's theory of gravity and quantum physics.

Einstein himself didn't belief in free will yet he admitted that quantum mechanics made this belief hard for him and stated that even though things seem random they are not and there must be some deeper theory that proves it, but since then no such theory has been accepted. I learned this from the book Einstein: His life and universe so if you are interested in the beginning of modern physics you can read that or use google.

So no that you know that you have no proof that free will is not possible confirmed by Einstein himself and many other scientists. The question is that if nothing is predetermined how does free will no exist? Of course you can still say you don't have a choice, but it is odd to say that it is likely you could choose either choice yet not have a choice because the chemicals and elections in your brain are atoms and they can not be predicted.

Also in the wild animals play, mourn the loss of their dead, and many more things. It's easier to observe them in controlled conditions ofcourse. Plus there are likely lots of nuances we miss completely.

Now why are we top dog when it comes to using our brains. Likely because we forced out our direct competition, like the Neanderthals. Plus having two limbs free to manipulate things, experiment with things etc will have had a big impact on the development of the brain and vice versa. Indeed we can teach animals new tricks. They can't learn them by themselves as they simply don't have the anatomy to get to tool using. Birds still surprise me with their clever use of sticks, yet there's only so much you can do with a beak.

Perhaps that's a prerequisite for intelligence to arise. The aility to experiment with your environment in an effective way. Some self reinforcing loop might start where the hands train the brain and the brain uses the hands to form understanding. Repeatable experiments are the start of knowledge. If you can only observe the world it might take a lot longer and never get to the same level. Learn through play isn't it.

Sure on a quantum level everything is based on probability, yet on a macro level the world is certainly deterministic. Otherwise how are you reading this post at where ever you are. All those random electrons somehow ended up prefectly predictable on your screen.

But true, there is a loophole at the quantum level. Some force, free will, could perhaps affect the probabilities and will enough atoms in the right direction to tip the scales in a decision making process. It seems rather far fetched yet can't prove it's not possible. We simply don't know enough yet, nor can we do any experiments at the quantum level without affecting the outcome.

First we'll have to map a decision making process at the macro level. Brain scans aren't good enough for that yet. We're pretty much trying to decipher what a computer program does by looking at a heat map of the processor board while its working.

For now Occam's razor seems applicable, and the simpler hypothesis is that chemicals and electrons do make the decisions instead of some kinda quantum manipulation.