Beneath metaphysical problems there often lies a conflict between what we want to be true and what we believe to be true. Dr Nathan shows how these conflicts can be systematically thought through, and proposes their resolution as a general philospohical objective. he then studies in detail a set of interrelated oppositions about the freedom and the reality of the will. He shows how difficult it is to find a freedom either of decision or of action which is both an object of reflective desire and an object of rational dis belief. He also examines conflicts about volition as such, contending that the veridicality of volitional experience is no less easy to doubt than the veridicality of our experience of colours. In this context, arguments emerge for a voluntarist theory of the self.