He converted to theosophy. He had detested theosophists earlier, his early work scoffed at speculative metaphysics (see POF), there is no theosophy in POF which contains all the ideas of his early days; he didn't use the language of theosophy until his conversion.

conversion: the process of changing from one system, method, or use to another

This "something else" is the whole point of The Philosophy of Freedom. Without it you just have what,.. rationalism? When you enter into pure thinking --or purer conceptual thinking with less stuff from the world in it like emotions, past experience, perceptual elements etc.-- new things start to happen. Intuitive insights are one obvious new thing. But other experiences might also happen.

The door begins to open. But this is a personal experience. Why make all kinds of assumptions based on someone else's experience? This is a trap that may cause a person to be blinded to their own experience while waiting for the experience that was read about.

But the point is that POF takes you to the door, but it has nothing to say as to what is on the other side. Each individual can see for themselves. POF is not concerned with this.

Anthroposophy is one man's imaginations. We each will have our own. Maybe they will confirm others, maybe not. POF is a foundation for anybody in search of truth. It can lead to any other "continuation" whether it is science, humanism, atheism, spiritualism, activism etc.

It doesn't have any special connection to anthroposophy, in fact it condemns the speculative metaphysics, feeling spiritualism, Divine will, religion, group conformity and most other things you find in anthroposophy. This is not to say it contradicts Steiner, but it certainly contradicts most anthroposophists. This is undeniable. But POF challenges most everything else someone follows or believes in also.

The "spiritual" activity was added later when he was trying to make POF compatible with his later conversion to theosophy. Why did he make the 1918 revisions to try and make it more compatible? Because it wasn't.

He declares his "mood of thought" in the intro to the original 1894 preface. It is INDIVIDUALITY not spirituality (the mood is here in the original chapter 1).

In the following is reproduced, in all essentials, what stood as a preface in the first edition of this book. Since it shows the mood of thought out of which I wrote this book twenty-five years ago, rather than having any direct bearing on its contents, I include it here as an appendix. I do not want to omit it altogether, because the opinion keeps cropping up that I need to suppress some of my earlier writings on account of my later ones on spiritual science.

Why does he mention that many say his earlier writings contradict his later? Because they do! Well, in approach anyway. He declared the difference when he said POF contained no results of clairvoyant research.

You say an impartial reader will say: "Hey, this guy's coming from a spiritual agenda". What? I view the book as presenting 12 views. The spiritualist and pneumatist views on occasion make spiritual references because the book is broadminded to include all views. But it more often slams the spiritual as it also slams materialism.

This is the most spiritual he gets (pneumatism 5-8). In thinking, we have that element given us which welds our separate individuality into one whole with the cosmos. In so far as we sense and feel (and also perceive), we are single beings; in so far as we think, we are the all-one being that pervades everything. It is spiritual by mentioning God but individualistic by saying "we are God".

Here is another example of an individualistic spirituality. (pneumatism 10-8) The moral laws which the metaphysician who works by mere inference must regard as issuing from a higher power, are, for the adherent of monism, thoughts of men; for him the moral world order is neither the imprint of a purely mechanical natural order, nor that of an extra-human world order, but through and through the free creation of men.

So the overall mood is individualistic, not spiritual. When spiritual is mentioned it is either slammed or put in an individualistic context. I think the book is some form of humanism, as the human is at the center.

9-1 "The Psyche-Physical Organization contributes nothing to the essential nature of thinking, but recedes whenever the activity of thinking makes its appearance."

This is a 1918 addition to chapter 9 but it may be the most significant statement in POF. The activity of thinking is capable of stilling the influence of the Psyche-Physical Organization making freedom possible.

I wouldn't call this some "spiritual" power as it is commonly used. But I would call it a non-material power, saying that thinking activity is a non-material process that has a non-material power. I suppose I would call it the power of thinking.

The beginning of chapter 9 tries to explain this phenomena, not as a "spiritual" power, but as arising out of human consciousness and possible because of the "self-subsistence" of thought.

Now here is an area worth further developing as the big question today is human consciousness and related topics.

Do explain what "pared-down sylogistic presentation" means. 

By selecting "reply" the new post appears under the post being replied too.

9-1 "The essence which is active in thinking has a twofold function: first, it represses the activity of the human organization; secondly, it steps into its place."

The theory of Determinism is based on the idea that we are controlled by the psyche-physical organization and cannot escape from it (psychological and physical determinants).

If anyone could develop a scientific experiment to prove this they would win a Nobel prize.

You see this as meaning something else? What?

When you add a hypothetical assumption about destroying nerve matter you enter yaya land like the example in 7-1 of atoms and have little hope of an answer.

It is always dangerous to bring spiritual speculations from Steiner's later work into POF. Everything you need to understand POF is within POF. It may be in another chapter or in a better translation or may appear in the future, but bringing in outside references is always risky as Steiner's later terms are changing as his concepts develop.

When I observe my thought I see that if I am emotionally upset but enter conceptual thinking to sort things out, the emotionalism steps back. Or the emotionalism will prevent the thinking to occur. They don't seem to be able to occupy the same space.

I am able to observe my conceptual thinking and emotions and determine their relationship. Perhaps Steiner was able to have clairvoyant experience of nerve matter, but I'm not aware of anybody else who has.

He made a conscious decision not to include such stuff in POF. By making this decision, it would be a contradiction then if you needed his clairvoyant work to understand POF.

I defined conversion: "the process of changing from one system, method, or use to another"

Steiner could express his experience through any group or system he wanted. He was in the philosophy/science world of terms and topics, but then converted to the terms and topics of the theosophy world probably because they invited him to lecture and were an eager audience.

Philosophy/science had rejected him, otherwise it would have made little sense to turn to people who really didn't and don't matter much culturally.