Consciousness, determinism, and free will in nineteenth-century Portuguese medical thought: Resonances with contemporary neuroscience.

In nineteenth-century Portugal, physicians Miguel Bombarda, Júlio de Matos, and Bettencourt Raposo debated consciousness and free will as biological advances challenged the soul as a regulating principle. Bombarda defended a materialist view, arguing free will is merely neuronal activity producing the feeling of freedom. Matos embraced determinism, rejecting absolute freedom but allowing behavioral modulation through education and effort, creating an unstable compatibilist position. Raposo advanced a naturalistic view where the brain constitutes will and desire, leaving no room for genuine freedom. The article examines how determinism, materialism, and positivism shaped medical thought on consciousness and free will within a naturalistic framework.

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Abstract

This article examines the nineteenth-century Portuguese medical-philosophical debate on consciousness and free will, at a time when advances in the biological and physiological sciences were undermining the notion of the soul as a regulating principle. The works of physicians Miguel Bombarda, Júlio de Matos, and Bettencourt Raposo are analyzed, showing how determinism, materialism, and positivism shaped conceptions of the relationship between brain, consciousness, and freedom. Bombarda defended a materialist conception of consciousness, arguing that free will is nothing more than the manifestation of neuronal activity that produces the feeling of freedom. Matos embraced determinism and rejected absolute freedom, yet intermittently allowed for behavioral modulation through education and effort, generating a partially compatibilist but unstable position. Raposo, for his part, advanced a naturalistic view of consciousness in which the brain itself constitutes will and desire, leaving no room for genuine freedom. In sum, this article examines the medical contribution to the nineteenth-century debate on consciousness and free will, a debate that unfolded in a distinctly naturalistic and deterministic framework.