Implications of not having free will

[JuliaL]

I've always found this concept to be somewhat confusing; so the criminal's actions were predetermined and uncontrollable, but somehow our putting them on trial and in prison for breaking the law isn't?

Even if we're in a block universe, I can visualize a subset locus of space-time neural events which thinks itself free morphing into a locus where it infringes, is caught and convicted. As long as the overall system is sufficiently complex and chaotic, we won't be able to predict enough to confidently make the statement that the criminal could not have done otherwise.

If we somehow learn enough about the universe to show the exact causal relationships between the criminal, the crime and the conviction, we'll know so much more than we do now, that we'll be able to break the determinism and achieve unfettered free will.