“Up to us”: the Stoic take on the free will problem

Some of the ancient thinkers who thought about free will, left to right: Aristotle, Chrysippus, Epictetus, Alexander of Aphrodisias, Plotinus.

I don’t believe in free will, understood as a will that is somehow independent of the universal rule of cause and effect. That would be a miracle, and I don’t believe in miracles either. (Let’s set aside any distracting discussions of quantum mechanics, which are not helpful, since random events are not “willed” anyway.)

Then again, I also do believe that I...