tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post111027361594193214..comments2007-05-19T22:09:01.417-04:00Richardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16725218276285291235r.chappell@gmail.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-1110323580686580152005-03-08T18:13:00.686-05:002005-03-08T18:13:00.686-05:00(I'm afraid I cannot take the credit for the unified analysis; I like it very much, and the particular approach taken in this post is my own, but the fundamental idea comes from Feinburg, as mentioned in my previous post.)<br /><br />The laws of nature prevent you from turning into a goat. If there was truly nothing preventing you, then you would be able to do it. This conceptual truth follows necessarily from the broader understanding of constraints (including 'negative' ones, etc.) discussed in my previous post.<br /><br />As for your "true self" comments, it should be clear from the main post that I largely agree with you. My talk of individuals being 'sovereign over themselves' may be contrasted with paternalism, where other people run our lives for us. There is also the issue of internal constraints, which are undeniably real, but I do not think one must commit to the idea of a hidden "true self" in order to recognize this. (Compare this to physical illness or disability - the paraplegic is constrained by their condition, which poses limits to their freedom. A property of a person may still constrain that person.)<br /><br />I'm not sure why you're so critical of the "slave to no other" phrase; it was used more as a way to shift our perspective of freedom from talk about 'constraints' to talk about 'autonomy' - a framing or pedagogical device rather than an 'argument' in itself. Besides, the issue is not so trivial as you seem to think. A slave might be free to do all sorts of things, if they have a liberal master. (As Berlin notes, 'who rules me?' and 'what am I free to do?' are logically distinct questions. Similarly, as I've <A HREF="http://pixnaps.blogspot.com/2004/09/civil-freedom-vs-political-power.html" REL="nofollow">pointed out before</A>, a benevolent dictator might afford citizens greater civil liberties than a participatory democracy would.)Richardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16725218276285291235noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-1110287095927653382005-03-08T08:04:55.930-05:002005-03-08T08:04:55.930-05:00Oh no, the pain. The pain! ;)<br /><br /><B>The core idea is that the free individual is sovereign over himself, slave to no other, nor to his inner passions.<br /><br />There is something very right about this idea.</B>There is something that seems right about most truisms. Your problems is that you distinguish between a person and their inner passions. When you see that inner passions are mere properties of a person, it is obvious that there is no candidate object "master" for the inner passions to belong, and no "subject" to be ruled over. There is just the person.<br /><br />Again, your use of the phrase "slave to no other" is no argument, but mere definition. One is either free xor one is a slave - one cannnot be a free slave.<br /><br /><B> Rather than considering the person as a whole, some theorists posit a "true self", or rational ego, imprisoned within our vulgar minds. </B>You mean, just as you yourself did when you called a free person "sovereign over himself"? or do you mean it in some other way?<br /><br /><B>We can take these new insights and integrate them into the argument of my previous post, to yield a unified concept of 'freedom' as a 3-place predicate which relates an agent (S), an overcome constraint (X), and a goal (Y). That is: S is free, from X, to Y.</B>Impossible. I cannot turn magically into a goat. Yet there is nothing preventing me. There is no obstacle X which, if removed, might then allow me to become a goat. Your description, while applicable to many circumstances, fails in the face of nominological reality.<br /><br />It is like saying that 1 + 1 is not free to equal 2, or that the shortest distance in two dimensions is constrained to be a straight line. There is no obstacle, other than reality itself, preventing 1 + 1 from equalling true.<br /><br />In the case of a priori truths (a dubious concept at best, but anyway), it is not even logically plausible for some things to be. For example, it is not logically plausible that I could think without existing. This stands logically sound, awaiting only evidence. There is no sense in which it could be said there were any real obstacle to be removed which might allow me to think without existing.<br /><br />Unless of course I am the greatest God. Because we all know the greatest god overcomes the greatest challenge to action, and that, of course, is not to exist at all...<br /><br />-MPMelbournePhilosopherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08545158054301569926noreply@blogger.com