Philosophy in a Factory

So when I was in my intro to logic class this semester my professor at one point was talking about Descartes and his skepticism and I described it to a friend of mine with an example that was something along the lines of "Imagine you have a favorite pen. One that you know everything about, all the sights smells feel etc. and one day you let me bring it home as a favor and I bring it back to you the next day just totally burnt up. Its no longer the same color, shape, size, feel, any of that. How do you know its the same pen you gave me?" thinking I was being a real smartie with the thought experiment. Fast forward a month or two and I'm reading Descartes's meditations and come across the exact same thought experiment, only using a block of wax instead of a pen. My "original idea" turned out to be something like 500 years old. So I got a real kick out of the irony of that but at the very least I'm thinking like a philosopher!

       So the last month or so Ive been noticing a lot of talk (or writing I guess) about the concept of Free Will or really more of the lack there-of. I bought a book for my birthday specifically on the subject even and found a lot in it that I didn't agree with and a lot of arguments I felt weren't very well backed up or argued but it got me thinking and talking and a common theme I've noticed is that everyone seems to define "Free Will" something along the lines of "Thought or action free from any outside influence" which is ludicrous to think about.     And I really wanted to post here about my remarkable progress on the subject and how Ive come up with a better alternate definition because a day ago I would have sat on my high horse and claimed to and then my friends humbled me and got me thinking even more than the initial spur.     I and a friend initially settled on the suitably vague definition of "Thought or action free from an...