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Is Free Will an Illusion? The Metaphysics and Psychology of Choice | Prof. Joshua Hochschild

The Thomistic Institute

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Puppets Are Not From Outside

For schopenhauer, the human person is not so much an agent as the receiver of a kind of general life force. This is the will to live, manifesting itself in an untiring mechanism which does not have its sufficient ground or reason in the external world. It is possible to deny free will and yet ascend the great chain of being even higher. Couldn't we imagine that we are not collections of particles the storm, but some kind of self aware, though deceived and pathetic beast? What we are not puppets on the end of a string, but dogs on theend of a leash?

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