Historic Quotations Post II:

[underlankers]

In terms of a defense of democracy and its virtues, I can think of no greater summation than the Four Freedoms speech made by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in January of 1941:

Comments

[oslo]

You still need more to describe the difference. Here's why:

Let's say that you have three options - X, Y, Z - "in front of you," in the sense that no one's stopping you from pursuing any of them. Practically speaking, however, Y and Z are effectively out of reach - say they require the use of resources you don't have and can't hope to accumulate in time for them to be of any use. They aren't really options, to you. And then suppose that someone comes along and says, "If you give up your 'Option Z,' I'll provide you with the resources you need to practically pursue 'Option Y.'"

On your view, that person would be less free, because they would have a more constrained range of action. Even though that person would be able to pursue more options, they would on your account only be enjoying the "illusion of freedom."

I don't deny that your notion of freedom is conceptually important. What I reject is the notion that "practical freedom," of the sort I've described, is nothing but a morally deficient illusion with no relevance to what it actually is like to live freely and as we will. By describing your notion of freedom as "actual freedom" or just "freedom-as-such," this seems to be what you're claiming.

If you're not providing me a way to opt out, you are.

Is there a reason why voting and migration are not sufficient opt-outs?

[kylinrouge]

It's a view that advocates for a society and a government that doesn't attempt to mitigate externality. In a libertarian's world, the company that produces moldy ketchup will get beaten by companies that make safe ketchup because of an informed populace that knows the health risks, but this view is not held up in any known history in the world. Moldy ketchup overwhelmingly outsold safe ketchup, and it wasn't until government intervention that safety standards were enforced.

Libertarians assume people will in general make the best choice given their circumstances, but this never, ever holds up in history. Hell, I bet they're even willing to incur massive negative externalities and go back to a time of high mortality and illness just so their society is ideologically pure in their eyes. I would go so far to say that libertarians are a malevolent force in the world.

[oslo]

Well, I can be more specific about why I think my view on the nature of freedom is more plausible and consistent with usage than yours is. I suppose I understood my response to be designed to elicit some further explanation from you as to why your view of what constitutes "freedom" is to be preferred to mine.

Basically, while I think people might find something intuitively obvious about describing "freedom" like you've described it (as the mere multiplicity of options, the lack of constraint on action, etc.), I think that in real terms the sort of freedom that people actually care about - that is, that actually makes their lives more or less worth living - is more like the freedom that I've described. It does not reject your description of "freedom," but places it into context. It seems to me that people feel more "free," if they are actually able to do what they want to do, than if they are unable to do all of those things but are instead theoretically able to do things they don't want to do.

It's wrong to describe my position as "creating more options" by "taking away options." I thought my previous comment, in employing your own hypothetical framework, would make that clear. What your response here boils down to is something like this:

1) Freedom is just having lots of options.
2) oslo claims that someone might have more "freedom" when they have fewer options.
3) Therefore, oslo claims that someone might have more options when they have fewer options.
4) Which is absurd, of course!

But really what I'm arguing for is a more nuanced version of (1), which is that "freedom" is something that needs to be understood as more than just having lots and lots of options, at least if we're to talk about the sorts of freedoms that inspire people to overthrow tyrannies. If that's all it were, there would be no need to have left the state of nature. We also value the practice of freedom.

[oslo]

I get that, but the usage is almost Orwellian in nature.

Again, you're not really seriously entertaining the possibility that you're wrong about what "freedom" is. Because you're not willing to suspend that initial, intuitive assumption, any attempt to think about what people actually say and feel and do about "freedom" apart from that assumption reads as "Orwellian" to you. If they feel differently than you do about what "freedom" is, they're just wrong, and they're deluding themselves - this is all the explanation you seem to feel compelled to offer for their accounts.

But the view of freedom I've described is not "Orwellian." Indeed, it accepts as initially plausible your account. I'm not saying that the lack of freedom is itself freedom, for example.

Actually, we can see quite clearly what I mean if we consider two societies, both equally "free" on your account, but differently "free" in the sense that the people in one society enjoy a more thriving economy, more material wealth, etc., so that more of them are actually able to do more of what they're "free" (on your account) to do. Your view sees no distinction between the two societies, in terms of "freedom." But I quite simply look at what it's like to live in a thriving market economy with a fair amount of wealth and observe that the people there have more leisure, less stress, more comfort, etc. Why is it wrong to describe their lived experience as enjoying greater "freedom," apart from the simple assumption that it is? What enables your initial assumption about what freedom is to trump their lived experience and how they would naturally describe it?

Basically, you have two options. Either you can acknowledge that "freedom" is a more nuanced, complex concept than you've so far allowed; or you have to acknowledge that your notion of "freedom" is so narrowly construed that it's not evident why anyone ought to favor it over other kinds of values (denied the label of "freedom") that make their lives worth living.

[oslo]

Or, conversely, I have entertained it and found it wanting.

Do you mean anything by these kinds of responses besides, "I'm right, you're wrong, nanner-nanner?" Anyway, found what wanting?

In any discussion such as this, we can't hope to engage in a meaningful exchange unless we can achieve a kind of analytical distance from what we ourselves believe to be the case. This is precisely what you haven't done, when considering my statements about what the experience of "freedom" is like. As I schematically demonstrated, above, your analysis of my statements already assumes that your conclusion about what "freedom" is is itself correct. As such, it's no surprise when you come out the other side finding my account "wanting." This is what I mean when I say you're not "seriously entertaining" any alternative; you've already assumed I'm wrong, if I disagree with you.

As for other possible accounts - not presented by me - I simply have no basis for believing you've done the analytical work you're apparently claiming to have done.

Except you are doing exactly so. Your initial comment noted that "it's not wrong to say that not "wanting" is freeing." The argument is exactly that - if you have, for example, all your food provided for you, but it's nothing more than a vitamin rich gruel with nothing else to offer, it's not freeing. It's not freedom. It's a reduction of freedom alongside something being provided.

I don't know why you have to hoist a whole dystopian vision upon a simple observation that being able to go to whatever grocery store I like and to buy whatever I want there feels "freer" than being forced to deliberate more carefully on such matters. You want to categorically cast that pleasant experience as something other than "freedom," which is fine so long as we're clear about our usage - which you are not - but personally I find it completely natural and intuitive to describe the less deliberate connection between will and action that I experience due to my financial health as "freeing," if not actually "freedom."

It couldn't possibly be that I'm actually correct, though.

Petty and unresponsive.

What I am trying to do, with your notion of "freedom," is understand it analytically. You have said, "Freedom is just having lots of options." Okay. But lots of people mean something else by the word "freedom." You say they're wrong to call what they're talking about "freedom." Okay. If you're right about that, then we can ask: why should we care about your "freedom" as distinct from what they mean when they're describing "freedom"? Nothing about the way you've defined "freedom" compels a normative conclusion about it or the preference it seems to carry, for you. Alternatively, we can take the case for "freedom" as basically granted, because everyone agrees that they'd prefer to have more freedom rather than less. But this requires acknowledging that people mean something more than a "multiplicity of theoretically-available options" when they speak of "freedom." If we acknowledge this, then we have to notice that the way you've defined "freedom" doesn't comport with the common usage, in which case we need to revise your notion and come to a fuller understanding.

Nothing about the text you're responding to here requires asserting that you're actually incorrect. It requires, rather, acknowledging that your notion is critically underdeveloped, which it is.

[oslo]

Given that the idea that I could be correct, or that I have looked at the situation and come to a conclusion, doesn't seem to come up...

It doesn't come up because you haven't ventured to defend your views save in the most conclusory fashion. I'd much rather prefer to address the argument you're holding in reserve, but I can't do that if all you say is, "Well, maybe one reason that I don't accept your account is that you're wrong..."

In that I have examined, and come to a conclusion? Accurate. In that I've "already assumed you're wrong?" No. You've made an argument, one that doesn't match up with what's understood. You don't like the answer, so we're back to armchair psychology.

This particular comment relates to a schematic of an argument that appears to be implicit in the way you've read and responded to a remark I've made upthread. I think it would be more productive to address the accuracy of that schematic rather than to accuse me here of engaging in "armchair psychology." There's really nothing here that qualifies as anything other than rational disputation.

Or, conversely, that I'm correct and that the idea of "freedom" you speak of is not freedom at all, but is something that some consider freedom even as it creates further contraints upon the person in question.

In that case, you're stuck on the first horn: you need to explain why your notion of freedom as a "multiplicity of theoretically available options" is preferable to this "something that some consider freedom." As a bonus, it might be helpful to explain why people seem so frequently to be mistaken about what it means to be free.

There may be benefits to limiting freedoms - that it's given as acceptable that reducing choice is okay, however, is where the problems ultimately lie. But, seeing how my notion is "critically undeveloped," what do I know, right?

So when is it "okay" to "reduce choice?" Never? Sometimes? If sometimes, when? If never, why not?

When and why is "greater choice" to be preferred to what I've called "practical freedom?" Always, just because? Always, because "practical freedom" is a non-entity? (If it's a non-entity, why isn't it worth countenance?) Usually, because it results in greater "practical freedom?" Typically, but only if it increases rather than decreases "practical freedom?"

The fact that I don't know, from your comments, how you'd respond to the above questions except to suppose that you'd take a maximization of choice and theoretically available options - "freedom," on your account - to be intrinsically superior to any alternative despite its benefits, and that you'd further take this position to be intuitively obvious and not amenable to rational defense - this underlies my assertion that your notion is "critically undeveloped." It can't seem to answer the most basic questions presented to it, and you don't seem to be doing anything here to demonstrate otherwise.

[kylinrouge]

The problem is you're arguing on his terms, which is 'having the most freedom is ideal', when presupposes that absolute freedom as an end goal is beneficial to a society. This is clearly not the case, sometimes we must put the public welfare in front of their freedom in certain aspects in order to mitigate externalities. This is why we have laws and regulations.

[oslo]

The problem, really, is that Jeff has two terms. He defines "freedom" one way, but relies on the weight of common usage for its value, even though the common usage would define "freedom" differently. This is what I'm trying to help him to see.

[kylinrouge]

How would the common usage define freedom, anyway? It's such a vague word that it seems like a cop-out in an argument, like Constitutionality arguments for massive 10,000 page bills based on a single phrase in the Constitution.

[oslo]

You're right, of course. When you get more precise about what's meant by the term, you begin to see why it's not automatically self-justifying.

[kylinrouge]

Historically speaking, most societies that have done this are still around.