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As for your remark, Bill. I'd rather say free will is essential part and not mere faculty.
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If it is essential, then it is defining, thus whether or not you are a human is determined by free will. You say that “free will for me is... [the] ’right to choose between what I'm given.’” Fair enough. You would have to concede that in order to make a choice you would have to apprehend something that you perceive as good (those things that you are given), and be able to judge, via reason, which of the given is superior. Choice, after all, isn’t an action that our souls exercise automatically devoid of all connection to mind and body. Free will, accordingly, at its core is an action, which is choice. Choice involves perception, apprehension and judgment. If free will is a defining principle of the human person, the defining principle of man is the act of choice, and all that it entails (desire, perception, apprehension and judgement).
The flip side is: It follows that those who are unable to choose are not human. A physical impediment that renders a subject unable to perceive, apprehend, judge, or even desire could not be defined as human. Thus, someone who is unconscious ceases to be human. This is the danger when we define rational beings, not by what they are, but by what they do. The powers of the rational soul can not be used to define, only to deduce, the nature of the rational soul.
Free will, itself, is doomed to obsolescence. Once man reaches his final end, the ultimate good (for which all particular choices are ordered), then there is no longer any need for choice. Thus, if free will is the essence of man, then man ceases to be man when he achieves his final end.
Free will is pragmatic faculty that belongs to the potency of the rational soul. It is free because man can will or not will, act or not act, and he can will this or that, and do this or that according to his reason. Free will, like any other power, can be affected or corrupted by external influences (accidents). Thankfully, the ability to exercise the power of free will is not what defines us as humans. Likewise, I don’t think the exercise of free will would define elves and elves. Thus elven free will is not bound, necessarily, to operate as long as Arda lasts, and can be hindered, corrupted and even twisted. Even elves can make the wrong choice as is evidenced by the kin strife, and most particularly by Galadriel’s test.
This, however, isn’t supposed to be a thread about free will, but about immortality. I have to do some more research, but I think I’m on to something.