Spontaneous Or Involuntary Thoughts

Not all thoughts are necessarily anticipated and controlled.  A person can perhaps will away an intrusive thought, but just because one is experienced voluntarily does not mean all other thoughts will be.  The very possibility and experiential presence of spontaneous and/or involuntary thoughts, though, might seem to some people like confirmation of or at least evidence for the nonexistence of human free will.  Is it?  All that free will entails in itself is that people have a will that their own consciousness, not some deterministic biochemical process or external being like a deity, can control to some extent.  To be true, free will does not require that all thoughts are entirely able to be summoned and dispelled at whim.

Still, does free will actually exist?  In light of how certain experiences could be illusory, such as that of perceiving an object right in front of one's body (perception of this kind does not require that the thing being perceived actually exists outside the mind), could the way that we seem to have freedom over our thoughts and actions also be an illusion?  The absence of free will means that any conscious being is only a puppet of one kind or another, perceiving but having no power to make even a single choice, for their thoughts and behaviors are dictates by some other force other than their own mind itself.

Now, logical axioms like the fact that it is impossible for nothing to be true because then something is still true (that truth does not exist) are absolutely certain because they cannot not be true; them being false requires that they are still true.  My own mind, which is required in order for me to experience thoughts of any kind regardless of their causal origin, cannot be an illusion, though logical axioms are more foundational than even this and are what my own existence depends on metaphysically (that which contradicts axioms is impossible) and what I epistemologically rely on to verify that I exist.  I must exist to doubt or deny that I do, and any perception at all necessitates logically that there is something doing/experiencing the perceptions, whether they are inherently internal thoughts and emotions (which can only exist within a mind) or sensory perceptions (which are purely mental) that suggest the presence of external objects of matter (the external world).

If one's thoughts are uncontrollable, then one cannot ensure that they align with reason, and thus nothing is knowable.  However, logical axioms and one's own existence are absolutely certain because they must be relied on to reject them, and then a host of other things can be known to follow or not follow by logical necessity from them.  Since some things are knowable, with knowledge being possessed only where there is absolute certainty, I have free will.  I am thus in control of my mind and body apart from the aforementioned involuntary category of thoughts and from biological processes like the pumping of blood by my heart.  It is not just that it is stupid to believe one can know free will does not exist, since there could be no human knowledge if this was the case and this position is self-defeating in an extended sense (though some free will adherents might still stupidly hold that nothing is absolutely certain), but that the very nature of reason and introspection is that they are absolutely certain whenever a person makes no assumptions.  Absolute certainty means one has actual knowledge, and knowledge cannot exist without free will.

Even if someone truly does have a thought suddenly appear in their mind, neither prompted by an immediately previous thought nor having any direct intentionality behind it, they can choose to rationalistically evaluate whatever concept came to mind and discover or recall relevant necessary truths within fractions of a moment.  They are never at the mercy of having to believe in assumed or erroneous things, and the logical possibility and experience of spontaneous, even involuntary thoughts do not metaphysically exclude or epistemologically disprove free will.  I have free will whether or not a specific thought is spontaneous or involuntary.  I know this with absolute certainty, though if other minds have it as well--or if other minds even exist!--is beyond my epistemological limitations.