The roman poet Lucretius postulated his famous “swerve,” the random jerky motion of atoms, in De rerum natura to guarantee, in his words, “will torn free from fate.” Yet indeterminism provides no solace for the true libertarian; it is no substitute for free will. Surely my actions should be caused because I want them to happen rather than happening by chance. Trading the certainty of determinism for the ambiguity of randomness is not what Descartes had in mind. The libertarian conception of the mind requires that the mind controls the brain, not that the brain decides capriciously.
