Wanton Destruction

Take the unhappy heroin addict: he gives himself an injection because he desires the drug, but he also has a desire to be rid of this desire. The philosopher Harry Frankfurt has given such "second-order" desires a central role in his analysis of free will: we act freely, he submits, when we act on a desire that we actually desire to have, one that we endorse as our own. Beings that do not reflect on the desirability of their desires- like animals and, perhaps, our short-run selves - are what Frankfurt calls "wantons."

Holt, Jim (2007) The nannyish state, Prospect March 07

Who will teach me what I must shun? Or must I go where the impulse drives? —Goethe

I can resist anything, but temptation - Lady Windermere's Fan Oscar Wilde.

A crazier notion than that we are more than the sum of our spasms is not allowed much airplay, unless cloaked in some variety of theistic mumbo-jumbo.

See also:
False Consciousness
Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl (no, not read it yet)