Summary: There are two types of freedom: actual freedom and conscious freedom. Actual freedom is the perception of being free and having choices. This type of freedom determines the limits of our free will and moral responsibility. Conscious freedom is acting in accordance with our higher-order principles. This consciously free state creates and consents to the social contract since the social contract represents our higher-order principles of freedom and reason expressed through universal principles.

Sounds much better than "negative freedom" when you put it that way.

Or the illusion of freedom.

Quentin Skinner, reflecting on Gerald MacCallum and Isaiah Berlin in the review below, argues for a third concept of freedom.

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v24/n07/quentin-skinner/a-third-concept-of-liberty

there is no freedom when you have a physical body

Can you eli5?

What's your address?

/s

EDIT: apparently joking in response to an absurd comment is too abstract to be considered a valid (philosophical) expression?

What he said is not wrong; it’s just bordering on being convoluted. That was a difficult read for me… The writer has a good pulse as far as what they are touching on, but I wish they would’ve conveyed it a little better.

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Awwww!! He’s an illusion 🔮

A man is free when he wakes up in the morning and goes to bed at night and does what he wants in between.

Do we actually need to debate or complicate that?

So what's the tl;dr version?

Neither of these is negative freedom, though. They’re both positive freedom concepts lol

So Crowded House were right?

Yes we do.

Being able to do what i want beween waking up and sleeping is not my definition of freedom. "Wanting" itself can be free or not free. Just look at our current advertisment. It is eager to create desires. And it is succesfull in creating illusions of what we "want". So we need to be able to differentiate between the those " wants"

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Apologies. I try to write clearly but I could have been better here. Reading it over, it did seem very abstract. If you have any advice on how to make writing like this more engaging, I’d love to hear it.

To me it describes willingly conforming to negative freedom. The freedom where you only act within a set of constraining social norms telling you what not to do. It's just explained from a different angle. It's literally though shalt not because of social norms, except you're sooo happy and consciously free because you're not exhibiting full positive freedom beyond social norms.

Is there a social contract in the first place? Can the terms of the contract be rejected?

From what I understand, which I could be wrong; the writer makes 2 differentiation between Freedom

Actual Freedom which is the definition of Freedom: Do whatever you want.

And Conscious Freedom: A "Freedom" to choose to limit yourself so you don't do what society consider as bad. Such as society/law telling us Murder is bad and we shouldn't do it. And we have the "Freedom" to agree to it and practice it; that is, not committing murder.

Feels like unnecessary to make them different tbh. But that is my personal opinion.

I kinda agree this feels like overcomplicating things.

Philosophy thrives on unnecessary distinctions based on customized definitions of concepts.

Please correct me if I'm wrong but for me it sound like actual freedom in political terms would be anarchy and the other one is the freedom we produced by having a state with laws.

So the former is more like a concept that has never been achieved (I imagine even in early nomad like human groups there were some rules that could make you enemy of the group while breaking)

"Actual is... the perception of..."

Red flag.

Yes there is a social contract which shapes our moral law and grounds our legal system. I discuss it here and my substack newsletter is dedicated to the topic. If you have concerns with contractualism/contract theory, let me know and I'll address them in a future post.

The contract doesn't rely on literal consent, but what our consciously free selves would accept or our free selves that act in accordance with our principles. So we cannot reject the terms of moral law. We can only obey or violate it.

Unfortunately, since you are replying for my comment about the summary of OP's writing.

This reply better off be sent towards OP instead of me. I am not the one making this philosophical take, the OP did.

Theres some I agree and some I don't.

True too. Though I feel in this particular scenario it's...Really unnecessary.

Not OP but I agree with you, just want to nitpick a bit - anarchy isn't absence of rules, it's the absence of state. Early nomads were quite possibly anarchic so you're right.

Absolute freedom is a wild concept, even if it's a construct that can never see fruition. Because our actions don't exist in a vacuum and therefore we're restrained by the consequences. I think Sartre says something along those lines?

Exactly! We're always under the constant influence of social programming. It's like our lives have kinda been designed already, in a way. Not in the destiny and fate way, but yeah.

4127 Harvey drive NY , don't forget the lube

I discuss my views on free will here. Like all of our inductive knowledge, free will exists as perception and experience. This is what I mean by actual freedom. And its this freedom that sets the boundaries of our moral universe (who are the members of the moral community and what ethical rules can be created).

Anarchy in a political sense does not mean no laws. It means no vertical hierarchy however people would still be in leadership/managerial positions chosen and rotated and without absolute authority.

All I have is diamond sanding paste, should help with the physical body freedom though.

/s

Edit: Dang, I searched the address expecting something like a YMCA or "freedom center" or some such thing.

Ok that's fine,sorry to let you down,that's my address tho,don't leave me hanging

It’s fine, I’ve written some pieces that read the same in hindsight; You’re certainly going to have moments like that as a writer.

The piece about the chair was the point I was looking to grab hold/sink my teeth into the article. But, I found myself reading it several times to really absorb it. I eventually got what you were trying to say, but when I break down concepts in my writing? I insert myself and space out my ideas to where it sounds and looks more like a conversation instead of a paragraph.

“For example, we say that a chair exists because we perceive a chair to exist. We don’t call a chair “something that causes the perception of a chair, but which objectively we cannot call a chair since its existence as such is subject to our perceptions of it.” Instead, we call it a chair.”

If I had to rephrase, it would look like.

“Let’s say we are looking at a chair. It has the traditional characteristics… Four legs, a seat, and a splat/seat back.”

“We wouldn’t look at it and say “It’s the culmination of four legs, a seat, and a splat, giving the image that some would perceive of a chair”… If it were created with the purpose of being a chair? Then, its purpose isn’t up for subjectification; It’s a chair.”

i dont get why my comment is absurd when it makes total sense and what i really dont get is why you r asking my address, even as a joke. whats the relation?

Thank you, I’ll keep that in mind! I should have taken more time to explain this example, but instead I summarized my views on free will too quickly. Much appreciated!!

I discuss my views on free will here. Free will exists as a phenological experience and it shapes the boundaries of our moral universe. If free will is an illusion, then everything must be an illusion. So long as we can say our perceptions of the world exist, free will exists.

If you have any criticisms, I'd be happy to hear them and address them in future posts.

Actual freedom: the sensation/experience of freedom. Its what we mean when we say free will

Conscious freedom: acting so as to live up to our higher-order principles. We are free from the constraints that prevent us from acting according to our ideals. This is obeying the law that we ourselves would legislate (a Kantian idea of freedom).

These definitions are internal, rather than external, like liberty.

These definitions are useful since I've read the term "freedom" being used in both meanings, which is confusing.

However, let me know if you have any criticisms. I'd be happy to respond.

I’m reading it again as I message you! It’s really good! The chair part was the one that I saved to my notes on my initial reading before I even commented… Liberty From and Liberty To along with the two types of freedom you spoke upon should definitely be explored more. I even bookmarked the post. Reading it today after my initial reading yesterday? It flows MUCH better. Took me a min to match my reading cadence to your writing cadence but otherwise it’s good!

That means a lot!! However I’ll be cautious in future posts to not rush through ideas and keep the reader in mind. Your feedback is hugely appreciated and I hope you’ll continue slogging through while I make the case for contractualism.

Actual freedom is a descriptive fact. It's only the experience of free will (what we mean by free will), or our actual selves. While actual freedom sets the boundaries of our moral community (members must be free and moral rules are limited to those we can freely obey) our actual free selves aren't parties to the social contract.

Conscious freedom (or as philosophers may call it, autonomy) is acting in accordance with our higher order principles. For social contract purposes, this means that our conscious selves would create universal moral rules based on the principles of freedom and reason. Our consciously free selves create and consent to the social contract.

Our actually free selves wouldn't create our moral rules, its only a descriptive fact that we experience free will (and this is what we mean when we talk about free will) and its this experience that gives us moral responsibility. It's freedom in the broad sense.

Our consciously free selves is the self that acts in accordance with its higher order principles by reflecting on itself and its actions (or philosophical autonomy). And its this free self that creates our moral rules.

So actual freedom is just possessing free will and conscious freedom is acting in accordance with principles and consequently, the ability to create moral laws.

I'll be discussing these ideas more in future posts if you are interested, but let me know if you'd like me to clarify anything or if there's something I should talk about going forward.

> It's only the experience of free will (what we mean by free will)

Ugh...Why are you saying what's inside the () as the same thing as you previously said?

> While actual freedom sets the boundaries of our moral community (members must be free and moral rules are limited to those we can freely obey)

What does that even mean? How does freedom sets boundaries of moral community? And how does what is inside the bracket even explains it? Yes Moral Rules are limited to those we can freely obey, even if that is not always the case. But how does it sets boundaries of moral community, how does freedom sets it.

You have the freedom to set boundaries, doesn't mean freedom itself sets it. How does that make sense?

> Conscious freedom (or as philosophers may call it, autonomy) is acting in accordance with our higher order principles. For social contract purposes, this means that our conscious selves would create universal moral rules based on the principles of freedom and reason. Our consciously free selves create and consent to the social contract.

Hence our conscious selves creates boundaries...Which we have the freedom to create.

I am not saying you can't differentiate them, it's just seemingly pointless to do so. And what you said here doesn't seems to actually support your point from my view.

kinda just seems like positive v negative freedom.

only difference is semantics over 'choosing' to follow social norms.

eh, more like the US vs China.

in the US one has freedom to do pretty much whatever (obviously within some bounds) ie you can become rich enough to dismantle society itself and you are 'free' to do so (Jeff Bezos, Musk, Gates etc ie positive freedom: freedom from external interference).

in China one is free to do whatever they want within the context of larger society ie you can become rich but not enough to dismantle society itself (Jack Ma being punished for doing what Gates and Bezos did: vertical integration to the point of being able to effectively blackmail the nation ie negative freedom).

there is no absolute freedom or even a framework for it (even Anarchy has rules just no centralised authority) outside nature.

>So we cannot reject the terms of moral law. We can only obey or violate it.

well, actually we can.

just move societies, dont like US values? move to the EU or China id they fit better.

luckily morals differ across the world, so we can pick and choose those we prefer in a limited fashion.

>So we need to be able to differentiate between the those " wants"

fairly easy frankly, maybe not for all but for some.

all i want is land somewhere so i can avoid society as much as humanly possible, ads do not and can not work on someone who refuses to buy or own anything (31 with 3k in total possessions and i buy solely on price per volume/weight).

its a shame most people need to fit in and be like the rest (more people need to know themselves and what they actually want, i do agree)

Positive and negative freedom describe relationships with others. These concepts are internal.

Morals don’t differ, although formal legal rules can. All just laws must rely on the same foundational moral principles. My substack is focused on addressing just this issue and will be happy to address critiques in future posts.

You mean phenomenological experience?

You can't expect everyone to be as solitary as you wish to you, nor can't you expect everyone to know themselves. We are a species that evolved through cooperation and continues to need to cooperate with each other.

Our whole culture is based on hegemonic power structures. We are way too far from establishing something else in our ways of thinking and in our culture (if that is even possible). What we currently can do is to question the hegemonic opinion more often than before.

Advertisements do work on most people, since they are constructed to work on most people (our knowledge on psychology is scary!). Lucky you, that you are beyond consumerism. But think of the children and how many are taught to "not be consumers"

It is a shame that some people think that the "need to fit in" is the root of evil here. The contrarian position of the "need to be solitary" can be just as evil. Both needs are not evil themselves. It depends on how they are used and in what harmony they are used together. I am certain that we need this need to fit, so that humankind has an inclination of cooperation instead of an inclination of isolation. A general tendency towards trust to others is what made humankind humankind. Never forget that.

>the experience of free will (what we mean by free will)

This is controversial to some. Yet what I argue what we mean when we say free will is our phenomenological experience of free will, rather than an objective free will. This is why I separate the two.

And whether a being is free determines whether they are a member of a moral community, bound to moral law. I discuss it here. This is what I mean by freedom setting the boundaries.

For me, mostly all defintions of freedom are incomplete. As they forget a lot of things we need to adress, if we really want to understand what freedom is. So here is my theory in addition. it isnt complete too, but it is much more complete then many other ones i think. And its one of the few, that includes determinism. Which is, lets be honest, 99% of all reality. And even the 1% is not proofed indetermined. not even acausal.

The problem with this dualistic defintion, its dualistic. Dualism only work for yes or no. mostly all other systems are not dualsitic. So i dont think there is more then one freedom. So we have to find a complete defintion of it.

Second, there is no proofed free wil. You cant take this as part of the theory, without a good definiton of it.

Its not the freedom that determines, its the movement of the past that determines!

There are no higher-order principals, its all one system of movement, which acts together. Its only seperated in their field of reaction, but it all underlies the functionality! Does it work or does it not?! our separation of the higher und lower principals just shows, that we are not precise enough when it comes to biology, psychology and the social dependency which create all beings.

SO

The most important thing about freedom (and mostly everything else) is MOVEMENT. Philosophers mostly have a problem with this, because ... many of them are no physics. Which is very sad and quite a dilemma. Movement is a value, that is shared through all systems. And we must ask all the time: how does it come so, that something moves in a speific way?

This is very important as we must combine the freedom with the determinism!!! There must be a connection! We cant postulate, that theres a free-will, this is still something that needs proof!!! or should we say, a better definition!

So the first and important thing is: the freedom of movement.

Which means not really that you are INDEPENDENT, it only mans that you have more then one option to do. And all those options are determined. Still, thats no proof for deciosionmaking!!! Because the decisioons are bound to a very rational and determined logic of values. The only problem of autority is, when you have two or more same values to decide on. And even then, it is not really a INDEPENDENCE you have here, because your decicion is mostly triggered by fixed determined and extremly dependent reactions to limited inputs.

So if you are not able to move in a specific way, this can be because you dont see the option or something is blocking you somehow. So we say, we are unfree. But its not ONLY because something is blocking us, it is mostly because we are not ABLE/SKILLED TO MOVE.

And you are unfree, no matter if someone, like a gangester, or your own limitation blocks you. We will see, its all the same. Its all part of nature.

So skill/information, our structure reforming things, is a very important factor here, that makes us free. Gives us options. But it isnt a wider room of desicionmaking! Its only a room of movement, which allows you to to different movement then before!

Our decions are still bound to the order of reason and the maximum (social) profit and efficiency. The golden rule of economy.

So now we must understand, that all our mindstates are also only reactions to other movements and so on, its also only a specific movement we do. which underlies the same rules dependencys as all other movements.

So now, we have to consolidate all those infos together.

1. Everything is determined

2. Life is a "selfpowered" system and a social system and moves and builds up in a social way, heavily dependent on their environment. It sets "its own"/"a social builded" goal of movement. As we see later on, the self and the society cant be divided here! All individuals have a necessary environment and cant be seperated in their genesis or their freedom and skills!

3. Nature, Life, Society, and so on WE cant move in all ways, so our movement is LIMITED. We know that before we know what freedom is!

4. We become less or different limitations, if we are able to move in more and/or new ways. This new (should be) unlimited movements is what we mostly adress when we talk about freedom.

5. Our freedom of movement is determined, because all our movements are determined and our search for new limitations is a biological and mostly natural sense of life - of social adaption!!! Freedom and Knowledge and Reformation of OURSELFS/SOCIETY (which is the same here) are all part of the systenm we call life (on earth)!

6. Our movement of decision is only free in such a way, as we are able to narrow down all
   possible movements before we do the decision. Every decision is a door to a unfree
   system, because you narrow it down in the end to the own way you are going.

7. So the most important things we do, is to interact with our environemnt, and get the necessary input to adapt ourselfes in such a way, that our system is as succesfull and compatible as it gets. Therefor it is the bets, to have the maximum options or the most efficient skills.

CONCLUSION:

Freedom must be part of the determined natural system.

Freedom is mostly about building up alternate (better) ways of movement/life.

The decision is not the important thing about freedom. Its the process of creating new ways! Not just with our mind, with everything we are.

Information/Interaction with the environemnt gives us the idea of what is possible and all our other (natual given) skills make it possible to reform our (old) natural given structure/movements and make new (natural) structures/movements.

This is all part of the system we call SCIENCE and FREEDOM!

It is much more complex then many think!

Enjoy!

PS

one of the most important things of life, is to recognize our environemnt and learn how it works and so on adapt our movement to these social beings. our freedom is a fundamental yet determined thing necessary for this process of adaption and ... should we say re-birth ;) or lets just say, revolution!.

> is more then one

Did you mean to say "more than"?
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