My opinion is that one must develop the ability to increase their amount of will power. Free will is certainly, a romantic idea yet the notion that one cannot enact their will is in some sense fallacious. Here's another point. If one had omni will (god tier will power), would their will get in the way of their mental health? As in, would their will destroy relationships with friends, family and others with lesser wills. A fancy side note: If in fact there was a way to develop some form of virus to induce a state of free will, would it not be logically concise to say that the will to will was pre willed by an external source of coercion-- negating that it was in fact a willing rise to free will and insofar as this a paradox negating will power as a whole? Cool topic O.P.

Although it may seem an unsophisticated or trite argument Dennett got this one right. Something does not need to be real in the sense that the physical sciences define real to be "real". Dennett uses money as an example. Money is an abstract concept and not real in the sense that physical sciences use when the term real is used. Like all abstractions money. like freewill, is a representation of and a tool to manipulate the representation of something that is connected to physical reality directly or indirectly.

Cultural abstractions have varying degrees of utility depending on how they are applied. Mathematics has broad utility and is a very sharp tool but it is still just an abstract thinking tool that is bit sharper but no less abstract than money. Freewill is at the very least a cultural abstraction with utility in social organization and just as real as money. If you want to see more of this argument I have discussed it in other posts and tied it to concepts such as wild justice.

It seems that even very intelligent people have trouble with a concept necessary to understand freewill. That is the idea of randomness. Like the concept zero randomness cannot be experienced. We are not blank slates and even if we were we do not exist outside of experience either as a result of internal or external stimulations. That which we cannot experience will always "feel" "unreal".

The debate goes on as to quantum physics demonstrating true randomness. In some sense random is as "unreal" as freewill. Yet most people accept that evolution is dependent on random mutations. You could argue that random is just a stand in for unknown causes but consider something even more obvious than evolution, Brownian Motion. Take a look at a standard definition of Brownian motion.

Particle diffusion (Brownian motion) occurs because particles suspended in a liquid or gas are bombarded by the molecules in these fluids causing the particles to move in a random fashion. ... Particles with a high diffusion coefficient have high mobility and mix rapidly in the fluid systems.

There is that pesky concept of randomness again something the strict determinists say is unreal. Yet most chemical processes are in some sense reliant on particle diffusion. For our purposes we can just accept that random is a useful concept and avoid all the intellectual traps that determinism implies.

Even if we assume, as Dennett seems to, that our brains are wet computers the value of "random" inputs to prevent looping is evident. The more complex the structure the more the need for random inputs. An ant for example has a relatively simply nervous system and the required randomness to prevent looping comes from the environment. For more complex nervous systems randomness may be part of the design or simply arise out of complexity. In either case it is essential for generating options. In this sense all freewill is would be behavioral options. That not all options are acted on is a result of what we call imagination. Keep in mind that the sophistication of organisms much less complex than humans are capable of "choosing" between options they have "Imagined".

Social animals must make very complex choices, that those choices may not rise to the level of freewill seems to draw too fine a point. What intellectuals such as Sam Harris are really saying is that the broad range of intelligence in humans means that some are better able to make the right choices than others. Some people will obviously have better imaginations than others. They can imagine more options and see consequences more clearly. This observation to me is as unsophisticated and trite as Dennetts take on freewill. Still it drives most of the intelligentsia towards a socialist orientation. To me E.O. Wilson's take is more sophisticated "Socialism: Good idea, wrong species". Complex organism are by evolutionary "design" "free" to make choices. As Peterson points out even Chimpanzee societies are more stable where the members choose to participate than under the direct control of even competent leadership.

Freewill is a natural and necessary abstract concept for the maintenance of social order. We are the cultural ape and should not underestimate the fragility or complexity of evolved culture.

Can sentient conscious experience exist without free will? If so then it must be illusory. I think we cannot understand free will without fully understanding consciousness.

I think we have a will. However, how free it is is debatable. None of us are sovereign.

The way I see it you either have free will or you are a victim to fate itself. I choose the former.