Although I share Descartes’ confidence that I am conscious, I’m not so sure about free will. It is difficult to escape Schopenhauer’s conclusion that “you can do what you will, but in any given moment of your life you can will only one definite thing and absolutely nothing other than that one thing.” 20 Nonetheless I will continue to act as if I have free will and to believe in it, so long as I don’t have to explain why.
