{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 4/l01/p012","lang":"en","edition":"AP1986","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"text":"Another form of expression runs: To be free does not mean to be able to want what one wants to, but rather, to be able to do what one wants to. The poet-philosopher Robert Hamerling has characterized this thought in sharply outlined words in his *Atomistic Theory of Will*:[^5] “The human being can, to be sure, *do* what he wants to—but he cannot *want* what he wants to, because his wanting is determined by *motives*!—He cannot want what he wants to? But let us consider these words again more closely. Is there a reasonable sense in them? Freedom of will would therefore have to consist in the fact that one could want something without reason, without motive? But what then does wanting mean other than *having a reason* for preferring to do, or to strive after, this rather than that? To want something without reason, without motive, would mean to want something, *without wanting it*. With the concept of wanting, the concept of motive is *inseparably* linked. Without a determining motive the will is an empty *capability*: only through the motive does it become active and real. It is therefore entirely correct that the human will is not “free” inasmuch as its direction is always determined by the strongest of its motives. But it must on the other hand be admitted that it is absurd, in the fact of this “unfreedom,” to speak of a conceivable “freedom” of the will which would end up being able to want what one does *not* want.”","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"I. Conscious Human Action","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":253,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012?edition=AP1986","alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":null,"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["AP1986","GPP1916","RSP1964","RSPC1949","RSPI1963"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/4/l01/p012"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSP1964","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012"},{"lang":"en","edition":"AP1986","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012?edition=AP1986","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"GPP1916","edition_basis":"Steiner 1894 first edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012?edition=GPP1916"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPC1949","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012?edition=RSPC1949","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPI1963","edition_basis":"Steiner 1918 revised edition","is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/4/l01/p012?edition=RSPI1963"}],"authorship":{"kind":"dialogue","is_steiner":false,"speaker":"Another form of expression runs","note":"A labelled turn in a transcript, spoken by Another form of expression runs — NOT Rudolf Steiner. Verbatim, but do not attribute it to him."},"attribution_warning":"A labelled turn in a transcript, spoken by Another form of expression runs — NOT Rudolf Steiner. Verbatim, but do not attribute it to him.","witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.14,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":3419,"original_word_count":3011,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 4/l01/p012"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}