h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

These are just a few thoughts I had a while back. I was looking through all my old writing folders and thought this might make a good journal entry:

What matters most to me is not a physical thing. You can't touch it, you can't see it, and you can't sense it. But it is the single most important thing to me, and to everybody on the planet. What I treasure most is my free will.

Free will is a funny thing. While treasure my free will, I am not entirely sure whether or not it exists. If every event has an explanatory cause, then having an explanatory cause makes an event not free. Are human actions "events"? Are human actions free or predetermined on a sub-atomic level? If free will doesn't exist, then its illusion must. And if this is an illusion, it's close enough to the real thing. At least, I don't *feel* like I'm not in control of my mind, or that there even *is* a "me" to be in control. That's not something I'm going to dwell on.

Free will lets me make my own choices. I can choose to do whatever I want, but I must face the consequences for my actions. I can choose not to go to school, but the consequence would be receiving a poor grade for the year.

I see free will as a little different from freedom. While free will is the ability to make decisions, freedom is the opportunity to make them. A person in a body-freezing coma has free will, but no chance to use it and therefore no freedom.