Someone must lose. Given that capitalism is in the crisis of its life, the current system and the "powers that be" who work to preserve the current system must deprive people of more and more freedom to life fulfilled lives because people need financial resources to live fulfilled lives, and the capitalist have every intention of acquiring those resources for profits that are diminishing. So the only solution is a long-term one to deprive the capitalists of their perceived "freedom" to exploit workers and consumers for profit and establish a new system that puts the control in the hands of the people sans profits. With Trump in the White House this won't be happening any time soon.
The point is that it is like maggots deciding how to govern themselves. It doesn't matter. Because they still will be maggots. And maggots don't deserve freedom. The title of your thread asked "what is freedom." I answered you. It is bullshit! The idea of freedom is something that means FAR more to a corrupt person than it does to an incorrupt one. Also, you can't have complete freedom without without it infringing on the freedom of somebody else to not be exposed to your "freedom." Just as you can't have complete sovereignty without your sovereignty infringing on somebody elses sovereignty to not be exposed to your sovereignty.
How very amusing. No, that's how you overstand things which might otherwise pose a threat to your prejudices; so it should hardly be surprising that if there is anything that is not apprehensible by such methodology, it's transcendent principles. Yes, perish the thought that the understanding of freedom might yield a consequence not thoroughly vetted by pinhead philosophers. No, that's the label you applied to the thread, which has no more to do with freedom than 99% of the threads started by atheists about "God" have to do with God. I'm alluding to a principle, an essence, a spirit, obviously - not a concept, which at its absolute best can never be more than an abstraction from a transcendent principle.
Well, philosophers seem to me a better bet than people who don't want to consider all sides and who are not well versed in the history of ethics and other kinds of philosophy. Like, I understand that you are worried about me misunderstanding or misrepresenting your position, but I'm equally worried about people making simple mistakes and not finding them due to lack of consideration. I don't see in what way they would not be about God or freedom or whatnot. The fact that I predict some answers (or lack thereof) does not mean that that's not what the thread is about. Unless, of course, someone starts trying to defend not giving out the information instead of just having a clear debate. Hm, that might be my bad. I'm not a native English speaker, I tried to use the word concept in the loosest possible form, encompassing anything it might be. If the word concept has another meaning, I can replace it with principle or some such word. You allude to a principle/essence/spirit and I would like to know more about it.
As long as that's the best you can do, you'll never understand any transcendent principle. Yeah, I'm not about to consider any of the mulitiplicity of sides which are patently idiotic. Sue me. Given that the ruminations of ethicists have failed so miserably to beneficially influence the history of mankind, which has been dominated by despotism from the beginning, I'm pretty sure that doesn't matter. I'm not worried about anything. I'm just not going to have my time wasted. And by all indications, you won't have it otherwise. If only the problem were so trivial. Of course you can. Doesn't matter, because you won't have any idea what you're talking about anyway. Of course you would; but if someone with perfect understanding of it were to write a thousand page treatise on the subject, there isn't a doubt in my mind that when you got done reading it, you'd understand it even less than you do now.
It seems to me comparing things to other similar things is important in order to figure out whether something is wrong or not. This can include incorrect things for purposes of hypotheticals. The experience machine is obviously untrue, but still useful as a thought experiment. It seems to me that if you can avoid the critics by saying they wouldn't understand, you could get away with anything. What are you comparing to? To me, the example of an unexamined political philosophy is things like North Korea and similar despots, as opposed to many western governments. Oh, and eleven days of "nah, you wouldn't understand" doesn't count as waste of time? Well, certainly without explanation. If "nah, you just wouldn't understand" was a valid argument in any context, debating technique would look very different. That's why my word choice is generic, so that it would encompass whatever it is you're talking about without relying on specifically what it is. Then what makes you think you understand it, at least to the point that it's relevant in this thread? "Freedom" is an English word, and as such, its meaning is defined by its common usage. If you're referring to some concept/notion/whatever which is not what people mean by the word freedom, in what sense is what you're talking about "freedom", rather than just some unrelated spirit/principle/whatnot that you have thought up?
Freedom is improvisation within the law (of nature). Thus freedom is not unconditional, i.e. one is not allowed to do what one pleases. No, that's the freedom of the Devil.
To me, freedom has three parts. 1: Lack of constraints set upon the individual by the law not meant to protect other individuals' freedom, 2: lack of constraints set upon the individual by the society, and 3: the empowerment of the individual. So, if you lack one of these, you're not really free. You can live in a state where all the laws work perfectly for you, and you can have the means to live life as you want, but if you're for example a flamboyantly gay man, living in a society where people will illegally beat you up for your orientation, you're not totally free. Then you're bound by society to act in a certain manner to avoid repercussions. Or if you're a western muslim woman, getting sold off into a marriage. You're not really free, as the society you're a part of, puts constraints on you. A person with personal empowerment, that is, good job, good pay, and good health, will still not be free, if his freedom of expression is restricted by the state. And a person living in an area where he's not restricted by the law, or by the society, will still not be free, if he's dirt poor, has health problems not being treated, and can't find a realistic path out of the situation. A person without power over his own destiny, is not free. So, to create a free society, you'd need to focus on all these aspects of freedom. Libertarianism has the first one covered pretty great, but is lacking on the last two. Free market capitalism has the first covered pretty good, but not as good as the libertarianism, but is better at managing the second. But at the third aspect, it can go either way, great for a very few, decent for very many, awful for some. Communism, DDR style, is decent at the last one,(compared to how it used to be) somewhat ok at the second, but awful at the first. Market liberalism is good at the first, ok at the second, but the same problems as libertarianism and free market capitalism at the third, although a little less if health care and education is covered. Could go anywhere from awful to great depending on the individuals luck. Social democracy is decent at the first, good at the second, and very good at the third. So, my vote goes to Social Democracy. But that's hard to do in a huge culturally diverse nation state, without dragging down 1, and 2, which is why the only truly successful social democracies are small, culturally homogeneous nation states with a high degree of sovereignty. Mash Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Iceland into the Kalmar Union; Extended Edition, and it will end badly. I think this is why the larger states in the world tend to either swing towards free market individualism, or authoritarian collectivism. That freedom thing is hard to do, even though it often gets talked about in simplistic ways, since most of the talk is primarily about the lack of constraints set upon the individual by the law. Freedom isn't free, it will cost in one way or another.
So the laws of nature cannot be said to infringe on your freedoms? I would say our inability to for example fly is a lack of a freedom, although it's not one we can do very much about, nor is it that bad that we can't.
Well, nobody is stopping you. Trying to fly that is. There is an unconditional freedom, anihilation, but you will have to study buddhism for it.
Well, the laws of physics are stopping me, are they not? Is my lack of freedom less real because there isn't a person behind it? Edit: I should perhaps point out that this is not a super serious argument, I just want to see where it goes.
Who said anythyng about persons? I reffered to the laws of Nature. If you want to get complain about your lack of freedom, please reffer to the Good Ol' Dad.
Well in this world we are limited with those bodies and physical laws. There is no way to be otherwise.
Of course. But the fact that it couldn't be otherwise doesn't stop it from being what it is. The question is, is that a lack of freedom? In the hypothetical case that we could change it, would it be a freedom argument to say that we should?
Every game has rules. If you play by the rules, you can be considerd free. If you brake the rules, you will get penalties, including prison cell. But within the rules you are free to improvise.
Well bummer for ya. The question is nonsensical. Certainly it would, had I been doing anything like that; but of course since it's my time, it's my call. It doesn't. I shouldn't worry about it if I were you. It isn't, because this thread isn't about freedom. Well yes, common usage of the word by people who have no understanding of what it represents will effectively render it meaningless - a byproduct of the societal devolution that can be observed pretty much everywhere.
Well, not as long as you refuse to talk about it. I've made every effort to make it about freedom. Not meaningless, it will take on the meaning of the thing they talk about, which is how language works.
If anyone here is doing that, it sure as Hell isn't me. Were I to attempt to build a battleship out of cardboard, my efforts would be every bit as meaningful as yours. Yes, meaningless. Yes, they'll talk about slavery and call it freedom, effectively rendering the word meaningless.
Ok, then, go ahead and explain it. If I misunderstand it, why would that be your problem? Lots of other people have succeeded in talking about their understanding of freedom. Nope, the meaning of a word is that which two people agree on for it to mean, and a language is the extension of that to many people. If you think it means something else, it will be incorrect, unless you proclaim to be talking another language (or to someone who understands it to mean the same thing as you do). It's equivocation and is a logical fallacy.
Not going down that road again. Sure, I get it. You'd be happy as a clam doing Winston Smith's job at the Ministry of Truth.
Again? You never did a first time. Quite the opposite, they were using words differently to the user base, just like you do. You've decided that freedom means whateveritis, and the fact that everybody else uses the word in another sense doesn't seem to bother you.
Yes, again. Obviously you didn't understand 1984. What a surprise. No, you've decided it means whatever the majority of people can be gulled into believing it means.
Well, the people believe it means one thing. By definition, that makes it what the word means. Whether you think they've been gulled into it or not is beside the point. That point is orthogonal to that of 1984.
