Temporal Precedence Does Not Establish Functional Exclusion: A Causal-Control Analysis of the Libet Argument — with Companion Appendix "From Sketches to Models"

Abstract

This deposition contains a two-part philosophical work on the Libet-type experiments, in which the readiness potential (RP) is observed to precede the reported onset of conscious intention (W)—a temporal ordering often taken as evidence against conscious control.Main paper (v10.1, final integrated version) argues that temporal precedence alone does not logically entail the absence of a later causal pathway relevant to action control, and therefore does not establish functional exclusion. Distinguishing the neurophysiological measurement of RP from the report-based estimate of W, it isolates two interpretive gaps and proposes a three-level causal decomposition of control—structural (𝐶procC proc ), effective (𝐶effC eff ), and admissible counterfactual (𝐶cfC cf )—defined over distinct intervention domains (𝐼𝑅⊆𝐷𝑅I R ⊆D R ). Four failures of entailment are presented as countermodel sketches. The paper is a conceptual analysis with causal-formal reconstruction; it neither claims metaphysical discoveries nor infers free will from 𝐶cfC cf , and the three-level decomposition is explicitly framed as a formalization proposal rather than a completed proof.Companion appendix (From Sketches to Models) supplies the formal completeness that the main paper intentionally withholds. It (i) upgrades the four countermodel sketches to formal structural-causal-model (SCM) countermodels; (ii) defines 𝐼𝑅I R as a parameter generated by a background constraint set 𝐵B, dissolving the artificiality objection; (iii) anchors 𝐵B in the Libet–Schultze-Kraft data so the results are empirically non-vacuous; and (iv) introduces a phenomenological control PCPC proving that the experience of "could have done otherwise" is independent of metaphysical free will. The appendix modifies no result of the main paper and preserves its theory-neutral blocking.The two documents are designed to be read together: the main paper secures the conceptual boundary, and the appendix supplies its structural-causal foundation.