Exactly, agreeing what we mean when we say 'freedom' is primary to understanding if we have it or not. One strong qualifier put forward in his book is that we "could have acted otherwise" in any given situation. A strong case is put forward that we can, and this is driven by our values, beliefs, temperament and conditioning, which can be defined as a degree of freedom.

However I still can't get away from the thought that all of this is dependant on what has gone before.
"Consciousness is just the noise made by the firing of neurons”