Lecture V

What would this scientist actually have to do? He would have to deny the 1 and the will altogether and say, “There is no will, no trace of it exists in the human being, for we cannot find it.” Down in the organism is where the will is hidden, imperceptibly. As we have said, it is only taken hold of, felt, and experienced in the I. Thus, the will would have to be shown in order to prove the existence of the I. That is to say, if a scientist who is only dreaming now were to be absolutely honest, we would hear him say to his audience, “When we speak of the human being, we ought really to speak of will. To us scientists that is an impossibility. The will is nothing. It is an absolutely unfounded hypothesis. It does not exist.” That is what he ought to say if he were to be quite consistent. He would dream of external processes and deny the will.