Free Will is an illusion
Determinism is an illusion.
I believe that in reality they both exist in a continuum.
Compatibilism would be the best definition, but not exactly correct. The definition of Free Will would be changed to be more “autonomy”.
The future is probabilistic. Not deterministic, or free willed, but both.
Quantum Cognition is an emerging field which explains this.
The best way I can model this idea is like this:
Imagine a train on a track that has a few hundred tracks branching on the left and right:
\|/
\|/
\|/
\|/
Each branch, looks exactly like the previous branch, i.e \|/. The train looks like it is going uphill, with an infinite amount of branching tracks as it climbs this hill.
The train is us as a society, or a person, the tracks are the choices we make. Each choice opens up new probabilities. And the illusion is that it feel like you have free will of choice, when in reality each future choice is dependent on the past choices we made, on our physiology, our genes, our upbringing, etc.
Or, simply put:
You can only choose things that follow another choice made in the past. You cannot choose a future choice because you have not created the path to make that choice.
But at any point, you could choose to do something counter to your intended outcome. It happens all the time. You change your mind, you get derailed, you meet a catalyst for an unintended choice, etc.
What separates us from most other animals, is that we can make projections into the feature. Which are based on best guess probabilities that you can see of which choices we would make, or outcome we want, if things go to plan.