One ought to take care when speaking of freedom as something valuable in itself; the truth of such an assertion depends entirely on which sense one uses "freedom." In political dialogue, freedom often indicates the absence of coercion: one can be considered free when he or she chooses without external compulsion. This notion of freedom probably goes beyond simply being ever-present in political conversation; it determines the plane on which the discussion takes place and different political positions often arise from slightly different permutations of this concept of freedom.
For example, libertarians (and usually fiscal conservatives) understand freedom to mean the absence of government interference; the libertarian considers a person free when the government leaves him to mind his own affairs as he wishes. The libertarian understands coercion primarily in the sense of external violence. The liberal, on the other hand, understands freedom not as an absence, but as the presence of the resources which allow a person to carry on his affairs. The liberal believes that one can only be considered free when he has sufficient resources to exercise his freedom, and therefore freedom takes on an active dimension. The liberal understands coercion as not only active intervention but as material deprivation. Social conservatives offer a third perspective in which the government maintains a moral society. By enforcing a stable society with a clear code of morality, the government protects the conservative's freedom from having to suffer from the spectacle of public immorality. Here, coercion signifies the imposition of morally undesirable behaviors which affect others.
These interpretations of freedom arise out of a particular philosophic formulation of freedom: freedom as the autonomy of will. In this sense, human beings can be called free if one's choices do not get determined by outside forces but by one's will alone. One sees this quickly in the debate over determinism: some philosophers argue that all the choices a person makes have already been decided. Even if the cause of all decisions were to be found as the will, human beings would still not be considered free because the will is not autonomous (in that it could not have chosen otherwise). In this philosophic interpretation of freedom one can be called free only if the source of his or her decisions -- the will -- could choose any number of different ways and chooses based on a pure act of will in which no reference point behind the will can be found.
This understanding of philosophy is without doubt a modern one; one which has lost a higher idea of freedom. This higher sort of freedom requires something very like the kind of freedom described previously, it requires the capacity to choose without external compulsion. However, this sort of freedom does not consist in autonomy, but depends on one's essence. Freedom is the manifestation of who one is. This even applies in a limited way to non-rational life: a flower, if it receives nutrients and sunlight, grows and expresses what it means to be a flower. If it suffers deprivation of sunlight or nutrients it dies or becomes deformed in such a way that it no longer shows what it means to be a flower then its freedom has been infringed.
Similarly with a person: if one is an artist and has the means and opportunity to pursue one's artwork, one possesses freedom in respect to being an artist. If one does not have the resources to express oneself as an artist, one is not free. The uniqueness of human beings lies in our ability to express many different sorts of essences, to be free and unfree with regard to these different essences, and to govern these various expression with our rational faculty. Freedom does not mean simply choosing, it means choosing what is in accord with our nature.
Though human beings can express different essences, one stands out as particularly basic. The essence of human being seems to include and delimit things such as artistry. Indeed, it seems other human potentialities depend on -- and perhaps are only a modification of -- human nature. Therefore, one could reasonably suggest that the primary sense of freedom consists in how well a person manifests the human essence; a person's freedom for the most part means how well he or she lives up to what it means to be human.
This necessarily entails limits on the autonomy of the human will; the sheer exercise of the will does not in itself constitute freedom and can actually result in bondage. Certain action of the will acquire a significance beyond the will itself, a significance grounded in human nature. This means not all choices can be considered equivalent, that some choices stand in accord with one's human nature (in existential language: some choices are authentic) and other choices violate one's nature as a human being (existentially, these choices are inauthentic). At the one end we have virtuous activity; not virtue in the sense of conforming to universal moral law, but virtue in the (Greek) sense of human excellence. The virtuous man stands out as particularly showing what it means to be a human being; put another way, the virtuous man manifests his human nature well. On the other end we could think of vices, not as an instance which violates some universal moral law, but as activity which betrays one's own human nature. Degrading activities such as torture or prostitution stand out here as obvious examples.
At this point one who holds the modern view of freedom might say that even degrading activities express one's freedom, that if one prevents another from such things one violates his or her right of choice. In order to hold this position, one cannot simply propose that human nature is not static but dynamic, and that norms from one group cannot be applied to other groups. Few great philosophers would say that human nature can be expressed in a static fashion; most -- at least most among the ancients -- would be at home with the Aristotelian position that human nature comes to be through commonly shared meaning in a community. Further, and more to the point, in order to call an activity degrading one must mean that it does a disservice to the one who performs it; one must say that through degrading acts one misrepresents and reduces who he or she is. This relies on a coherent notion of a human essence, regardless of whether it is dynamic or static, grounded transcendentally or practically. Therefore, our opponent must either hold that there is no such thing as human nature, or that in principle it is necessary that some actions degrade ones essence. If one believes the concept of human essence to be without content, one can hardly argue about human freedom since by discussing human freedom one already operates with some latent concept of humanity.
Having put forth the ancient way of thinking about freedom, we might consider for a moment the coherency of the modern version. It seems that, if this sort of freedom is a good, the things which restrict it are bad. In the political sphere, we might think of certain laws, the absence of resources, or the imposition of riotous immorality as restricting freedom. But if we think beyond the political sphere to the wider implications of such freedom, we find something more controversial. It seems that autonomy is violated by every instance of specificity. That is, insofar as we are something concretely, we limit ourselves. Every time one chooses, one limits himself. If one chooses to be a liberal, for example, in that instant he closes off the possibility that he chose to be a conservative--even if he changes his mind later. If one chooses to travel to France, one cannot simultaneously be in Australia. Every time one exercises one's freedom, one simultaneously limits it. Even refusing to take stands and make decisions closes off possibilities, for temporality itself refuses such absolute autonomy. Existing in any definite way places restrictions on the will, and it is for precisely this reason that the theologian David Bentley Hart accuses the modern form of freedom as fundamentally nihilistic. The very act of existing requires us at every moment to be something definite, to close off our choices. The only way one can be absolutely autonomous: one must escape existence altogether. Modern nihilism can be directly linked with the demand for absolute freedom of will.
Part of the blame for this, ironically enough, lies with theology. David Hart describes how William of Occam introduced the notion of freedom as autonomy into theology as nominalism, which later became systematized as Calvinsim. I quote at length from his book The Beauty of the Infinite:
A full return to the full notion of freedom transforms not only theology, but philosophical anthropology and politics. It would reopen the question of human nature with a certain urgency, for – as Aristotle notes in the Nicomachean Ethics – the more understanding one has of human nature, the better one understands how to be virtuous; this, certainly, offers a better standard than adherence to universal laws. This, in turn, leads to political questions; as men are social animals, their freedom manifests in their engagement with others. However, it transforms the level of political discussion as well, for if freedom consists in manifesting the human essence, politics becomes the place in which this can be enacted practically.
For example, libertarians (and usually fiscal conservatives) understand freedom to mean the absence of government interference; the libertarian considers a person free when the government leaves him to mind his own affairs as he wishes. The libertarian understands coercion primarily in the sense of external violence. The liberal, on the other hand, understands freedom not as an absence, but as the presence of the resources which allow a person to carry on his affairs. The liberal believes that one can only be considered free when he has sufficient resources to exercise his freedom, and therefore freedom takes on an active dimension. The liberal understands coercion as not only active intervention but as material deprivation. Social conservatives offer a third perspective in which the government maintains a moral society. By enforcing a stable society with a clear code of morality, the government protects the conservative's freedom from having to suffer from the spectacle of public immorality. Here, coercion signifies the imposition of morally undesirable behaviors which affect others.
These interpretations of freedom arise out of a particular philosophic formulation of freedom: freedom as the autonomy of will. In this sense, human beings can be called free if one's choices do not get determined by outside forces but by one's will alone. One sees this quickly in the debate over determinism: some philosophers argue that all the choices a person makes have already been decided. Even if the cause of all decisions were to be found as the will, human beings would still not be considered free because the will is not autonomous (in that it could not have chosen otherwise). In this philosophic interpretation of freedom one can be called free only if the source of his or her decisions -- the will -- could choose any number of different ways and chooses based on a pure act of will in which no reference point behind the will can be found.
This understanding of philosophy is without doubt a modern one; one which has lost a higher idea of freedom. This higher sort of freedom requires something very like the kind of freedom described previously, it requires the capacity to choose without external compulsion. However, this sort of freedom does not consist in autonomy, but depends on one's essence. Freedom is the manifestation of who one is. This even applies in a limited way to non-rational life: a flower, if it receives nutrients and sunlight, grows and expresses what it means to be a flower. If it suffers deprivation of sunlight or nutrients it dies or becomes deformed in such a way that it no longer shows what it means to be a flower then its freedom has been infringed.
Similarly with a person: if one is an artist and has the means and opportunity to pursue one's artwork, one possesses freedom in respect to being an artist. If one does not have the resources to express oneself as an artist, one is not free. The uniqueness of human beings lies in our ability to express many different sorts of essences, to be free and unfree with regard to these different essences, and to govern these various expression with our rational faculty. Freedom does not mean simply choosing, it means choosing what is in accord with our nature.
Though human beings can express different essences, one stands out as particularly basic. The essence of human being seems to include and delimit things such as artistry. Indeed, it seems other human potentialities depend on -- and perhaps are only a modification of -- human nature. Therefore, one could reasonably suggest that the primary sense of freedom consists in how well a person manifests the human essence; a person's freedom for the most part means how well he or she lives up to what it means to be human.
This necessarily entails limits on the autonomy of the human will; the sheer exercise of the will does not in itself constitute freedom and can actually result in bondage. Certain action of the will acquire a significance beyond the will itself, a significance grounded in human nature. This means not all choices can be considered equivalent, that some choices stand in accord with one's human nature (in existential language: some choices are authentic) and other choices violate one's nature as a human being (existentially, these choices are inauthentic). At the one end we have virtuous activity; not virtue in the sense of conforming to universal moral law, but virtue in the (Greek) sense of human excellence. The virtuous man stands out as particularly showing what it means to be a human being; put another way, the virtuous man manifests his human nature well. On the other end we could think of vices, not as an instance which violates some universal moral law, but as activity which betrays one's own human nature. Degrading activities such as torture or prostitution stand out here as obvious examples.
At this point one who holds the modern view of freedom might say that even degrading activities express one's freedom, that if one prevents another from such things one violates his or her right of choice. In order to hold this position, one cannot simply propose that human nature is not static but dynamic, and that norms from one group cannot be applied to other groups. Few great philosophers would say that human nature can be expressed in a static fashion; most -- at least most among the ancients -- would be at home with the Aristotelian position that human nature comes to be through commonly shared meaning in a community. Further, and more to the point, in order to call an activity degrading one must mean that it does a disservice to the one who performs it; one must say that through degrading acts one misrepresents and reduces who he or she is. This relies on a coherent notion of a human essence, regardless of whether it is dynamic or static, grounded transcendentally or practically. Therefore, our opponent must either hold that there is no such thing as human nature, or that in principle it is necessary that some actions degrade ones essence. If one believes the concept of human essence to be without content, one can hardly argue about human freedom since by discussing human freedom one already operates with some latent concept of humanity.
Having put forth the ancient way of thinking about freedom, we might consider for a moment the coherency of the modern version. It seems that, if this sort of freedom is a good, the things which restrict it are bad. In the political sphere, we might think of certain laws, the absence of resources, or the imposition of riotous immorality as restricting freedom. But if we think beyond the political sphere to the wider implications of such freedom, we find something more controversial. It seems that autonomy is violated by every instance of specificity. That is, insofar as we are something concretely, we limit ourselves. Every time one chooses, one limits himself. If one chooses to be a liberal, for example, in that instant he closes off the possibility that he chose to be a conservative--even if he changes his mind later. If one chooses to travel to France, one cannot simultaneously be in Australia. Every time one exercises one's freedom, one simultaneously limits it. Even refusing to take stands and make decisions closes off possibilities, for temporality itself refuses such absolute autonomy. Existing in any definite way places restrictions on the will, and it is for precisely this reason that the theologian David Bentley Hart accuses the modern form of freedom as fundamentally nihilistic. The very act of existing requires us at every moment to be something definite, to close off our choices. The only way one can be absolutely autonomous: one must escape existence altogether. Modern nihilism can be directly linked with the demand for absolute freedom of will.
Part of the blame for this, ironically enough, lies with theology. David Hart describes how William of Occam introduced the notion of freedom as autonomy into theology as nominalism, which later became systematized as Calvinsim. I quote at length from his book The Beauty of the Infinite:
[W]hen nominalism largely severed the perceptible world from the analogical index of divine transcendence, and thus reduced divine freedom to an ontic voluntarism, and theophany to mere legislation, such that creation and revelation could be imagined only as manifestations of the will of a god who is, at most, a supreme being among lesser beings, theology and philosophy alike were surrendered to a kind of elected darkness; and when the nominalists, or those of the factio occamista who followed them, succeeded in shattering the unity of faith and reason, and so the compact between theology and philosophy (or as, in an Occamist moment, Luther phrased it, "that whore"), both were rendered blind... For theology, of course, this represents an incalculable impoverishment: it contributed to a quite unbiblical dread of the goodness of creation, a misconstrual of divine glory as a supernatural corollary to the majesty of the sheer power of a human monarch, the idolatrous diminution of God to the condition of a composite being -- rather than the source of all being -- whose acts could, like ours, be indifferently related to his essence, expressing or dissimulating his nature... At a critical moment in cultural history -- not that there were not various fateful moves in the history of Western theology that led to it -- many Christian thinkers somehow forgot that the incarnation of the Logos, the infinite ratio for all that is, reconciles us not only to God, but to the world, by giving us back a knowledge of creation's goodness, allowing us to see again its essential transparency -- even to the point, in Christ, of identity -- before God. The covenant of light was broken. God became, progressively, the world's infinite contrary. And this state of theological decline was so precipitous and complete that it even became possible for someone as formidably intelligent as Calvin, without any apparent embarrassment, to regard the fairly lurid portrait of the omnipotent despot in book III of his Institutes -- who not only ordains the destiny of souls, but in fact predestines the first sin, and so brings the whole drama of creation and redemption to pass (including the eternal perdition of the vast majority of humanity) as a display of his own dread sovereignty -- as a proper depiction of the Christian God. One ancient Augustinian misreading of Paul's ruminations on the mystery of election had, at last, eventuated in fatalism. (131-132)Calvin, in Hart's view, systematizes the perversion of freedom. Omnipotence, instead of indicating that God, in his transcendence, is always the full and perfect expression of himself, indicates instead the infinite power to dominate and control others in a way analogous to political power. But God's absolute freedom in the higher sense would mean a restriction on the autonomy of the will; God cannot do a great number of conceivable things, for this would be at odds with what it means to be God – or put another way, this autonomy would actually violate God's freedom. When freedom gets reduced to the autonomy of will it becomes theologically possible for God to willfully bring about evil, as Calvin makes evident.
A full return to the full notion of freedom transforms not only theology, but philosophical anthropology and politics. It would reopen the question of human nature with a certain urgency, for – as Aristotle notes in the Nicomachean Ethics – the more understanding one has of human nature, the better one understands how to be virtuous; this, certainly, offers a better standard than adherence to universal laws. This, in turn, leads to political questions; as men are social animals, their freedom manifests in their engagement with others. However, it transforms the level of political discussion as well, for if freedom consists in manifesting the human essence, politics becomes the place in which this can be enacted practically.
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