- The Underground Man repeats his earlier point that only narrow-minded people can be truly active, because their lack of consciousness allows them the comforting belief that there are absolute principles upon which they can base their actions.
- The Underground Man, in contrast, has nothing solid to support his actions, not even pure wickedness.
He analyzes his actions until the idea of cause and effect dissolves. Moreover, the Underground Man also overanalyzes his rebellions against this inertia—his blind attempts at love or anger—until he hates himself for forcing false emotions, and therefore feels paralyzed and becomes more inert than ever.
He feels he is an intelligent man only because he has never been able to start or finish anything. In this regard, his inertia is a mark of his consciousness
Man senses that after he fully achieves all of his goals, there will be nothing left to do, and so he fears that achievemen
free will is something that can be explained scientifically, just as every other human urge can be. He argues that science, regardless of what it might discover about the human will, cannot change the fact that man refuses to accept that his free will is subject to rules.
Man, he contends, will do anything to demonstrate this independence of will.
The only constants in man's behavior are that he is ungrateful and refuses to be sensible.
Man may even intentionally go insane, simply to prove that his free will is not subject to reason and that he may behave irrationally if he so desires.
t.
Reason may solve all the world's problems, but then man is left with nothing to do. Consciousness renders man immobile, but allows him to “occasionally whip” himself, which at least “livens things up a bit."
He wonders why he desires things like crystal palaces when he should be content with apartments, thinking his desire might be some cruel hoax.
He then remarks that those who live underground like him never stop talking once they start, even though they have been
