Sure, it doesn’t take away the ontological state of freedom, if there is one. But it does make it more unlikely they will choose an option. Unless they do not have physical attraction to people of the other sex or some other obstacel
having a moral code is a choice, but it can eliminate options, in fact they usually do. That is the self-contract, which humans break. I don’t think the OP is suggesting that having morals actually eliminates some kind of free will and imposes determinism. IOW it isn’t making that kind of ontological claim. It is saying that your Friday night options become much less if you convert, for example, to Islam and some strict version of it. Of course at east moment you could be viewed as making a choice, but the range of choices, as long as you respect your morality, are more limited. To the extent that the morality goes against your desires, this reduction in freedom is significant.
Where I disagree with the OP is that somehow working yourself up into a ‘moral free state’ where you would be willing to rape babies or whatever is not more free.
Gib, I think that’s just the problem. I can’t sit here and say what we’re arguing for freedom from, and no one else can in a way that can’t be picked apart with much validity. I’m saying the whole idea of arguing freedom from this vs freedom to that is as far as we’re gonna get with all the freedom talk, and in the end it’s about finding a balance of the 2. If I wanna be free to jaywalk, then I can’t be free from an increased risk of getting hit by a car and there’s not a rhetorical device in the world to change that.
It seems like the OP is considering
moral restrictions (or injuctions I suppose also) = reduction in options.
Some things you might choose to do, you no longer will choose to do because of your morality. Injunctions could in fact reduce the range of options down to one.
It’s not an ontological loss of freedom. It’s a practical, option based one.
If you believe that accepting a blood transfusion is wrong - a la Christian scientists - even if doctors say it is necessary, then one option is gone. If you become Muslim, drinking is no longer an option Friday night.
Wasn’t there some moral you had when younger that you now no longer have and you can think of this as having restricted your actions unnecessarily?
In a sense he is defining morals as self-restrictions, which is fair. He goes from this, I think, to glorifying a state of potentially doing horrible things, which I do not agree with.
Freedom needs qualifying as realistic freedom. Nobody is unfree because they can’t teleport at will or swallow the earth.
And you can still be free if you choose one thing at the expense of being free to do another.
Freedom as an objective ideal is stupid. It’s so obviously relative. What people mean when they’re free is that they’re not running up against so many obstacles when it comes to fulfilling their wishes, compared to others and one’s idea of what one is able to do.
Therefore, if someone doesn’t think they’re able to do something immoral, they can still think of themselves as free and not be wrong. In the eyes of another they may be unfree. And vice versa.
A wider range of choices doesn’t make one more free until they’re chosen, and once a choice is made, another is ruled out. There really is no universally “greater” freedom, only the perception of it that can only ever be specific to a particular culture wherein value sets are all similar enough.
But…
I think it can be a useful use of the word freedom if one uses it in terms of degree in relation to morals.
I think it can make sense to say that this particular Orthodox jew - I am thinking of a specific person - is less free than me, because due to their morals they must do a whole set of things at specific times and in specific ways, regardless of their mood and desire at those times, and also cannot do a whole range of things despite their moods and desires
if otherwise we are pretty similar in terms of beliefs.
Its not that he is ‘not free’ but it seems to me the word can be used as a qualifier in terms of degree.
A prisoner is free also. They can make choices pretty much all the time, just like I can, but the range is much smaller. I think saying he or she is less free makes sense. And it is was this kind of use I took the OP to mean.
That’s what I figured too. But to me, to be really restricted by morals is to think you have to do this or that (or not do it), which to me is the kind of morality we’re brainwashed with. So the kind of freedom that this kind of morality takes away is that which we would have if we would think for ourselves and follow our hearts rather than what societal indoctrinations dictate.
I think ‘thinking for ourselves’ is a very hard concept to determine in situ. What does that mean? Most modern people seem to constrain themselves unnecessarily even though they lack some formal indoctrination in their background and even though they might identify themselves as a person who thinks for him/herself. Guilt seems like a huge justification for many actions, not that it is always identified as guilt.
I don’t want to impose.
It would be taking up too much space.
I can’t make someone else uncomfortable.
I shouldn’t be angry, she’s {had this terrible childhood, had a bad week, doesn’t mean to come off that way, is less well off than me, has an abusive partner…etc}
I don’t deserve it because of X
and so on.
Good choices and good behaviors result in more freedoms and higher quality freedoms.
We are not slaves simply because we morally don’t want to eat shit.
Eating poop wont make you any more free. It would make you sick, and when sick, you loose freedom and health and all that.
Why don’t you agree with doing horrible things? Are you against freedom?
Think of this, if a person puts Freedom as his highest value, then he must reject all moral limitations for the sake of virtue? True freedom leads to all kinds of behavior both evil and good. A person who values freedom will value evil actions just as equally as good actions.
This step is needed first, before reaching the height of beyond good and evil. Only after one goes beyond good and evil, can one truly claim to “choose good over evil”. I don’t believe that anybody here, in this forum, “chooses good” based on a free choice. I believe that people automatically reject the evil, which is dangerous, which is against freedom, and which does not transcend you beyond good and evil. Evil is overlooked as the rational choice.
Once again, I’m asking what you mean by freedom. I don’t agree that, “A person who values freedom will value evil actions just as equally as good actions.” Very simplistically, if a person ‘values’ ‘evil’ actions over ‘good’ actions and chooses to go by that decision, s/he’s gonna by thrown in the slammer (if proven guilty) where all choices and freedoms are taken away. Imm (in my mind), you’re still playing with words. Still in all, even given societal restrictions, there’s freedom of choice. Unless you disagree. If so, I’d like you to explain what you mean by freedom–please.
Aside, I use in my mind (imm) rather than in my opinion (imo), because ‘opinion’ is rather set, while my ‘mind’ may not necessarily be.
Reality doesn’t care what you think it should be. And thus there are actions on your part that entrap you into less freedom.
It is from those concerns that virtues and morals are assessed (even if not accurately so). It is proposed that IF you stick to a limited range of actions, you will end up having greater freedom than if you had not. The same is true in almost any situation regardless of perceived virtues or morals.
Go into a foreign country and play freely and see how long it is before you are in a jail cell.
Go into a true forest (if there are any left) and ignore your situation so as to act freely.
See how long you survive to be “free”.
The greatest freedom comes from knowing the limits of it.
A dog has no right to decide whether it want’s to live in wild or want to be domesticated.
If domesticated , again it has no right to decide whether it can be vegetarian or non vegetarian.
It doesn’t even have right to decide with which dog it can breed. it’s arranged one.
Dog has no right to keep it kids with it. Only it’s master will decide .
And all these righteous moral happens in most civilized world.
seen that meat eating deer, but interested to watch fruit eating lion !!
Does that sound like an sadistic desire ?
You have it backward. The greatest freedom comes from knowing no limits to it all. There are no limits. There are no barriers. All is free.
You and liz are wrong about prisoners. A man with free thoughts is free wherever he is, whether in prison or outside. The true prison is in denying any form of freedom, no matter how evil it may seem.
The OP makes several assumptions, some of which moreno and others pointed out already, but I guess I’ll put my own spin on them.
First you assume that our instincts are always malevolent, and that our intellects are always benevolent, which is false in my view. If you were a snake or a complete/utter psychopath, your instincts would always be selfish in addition to taking the path of least resistance, but most of us aren’t complete/utter psychopaths, most of us occasionally feel compassion for others, and most of us occassionally feel like playing. Play (done to alleviate the feeling of boredom, a feeling snakes do not possess) is instinctually taking the path of relatively greater resistance as opposed to lying down until hunger or fear moves us. Furthermore, reason can persuade us to rest until prompted by necessity, perhaps reason can even persuade us to feed on relatively innocent people, I’m not sure.
2nd there’s always a little instinct in intellect and a little intellect in instinct, it’s not so black/white.
3rd it could be said that pathos constrains and limits the expression of logos just as logos constrains and limits the expression of pathos. The two are constantly competing for dominance, but they’re also capable of collaborating, like when pathos uses logos as a means to an end, and/or when logos uses pathos as a means to an end.
To sum it up, in my view the intellect and the instinct are more complex, and the interplay between them more dynamic than you give it credit. But is logos fundamentally descriptive, can it prescribe/will? ? I know pathos can describe/represent, by automatically linking one negative or positive sensation or emotion with another negative, neutral or positive sensation or emotion. What I mean is you can think with your feelings and feel with your thinking. Intellect can probably do most of what instinct can do and vice versa, it’s just one is more primitive than the other, more base.
I’d say there’s this tendency in western culture to assign different roles to reason and passion, and I’m not saying this inclination is entirely unfounded. What I am saying is - reason doesn’t always = the active, benevolent, farsighted, descriptive/representative force, and passion doesn’t always = the passive, malevolent, nearsighted, prescriptive/wilful force, more often than not maybe, but not always.
The two faculties are like the yin and yang of the mind, just as r selectors and k selectors are the yin and yang of biology.
maybe that’s because we can’t think outside the yin/yang dialectic, well perhaps some more than others.
Not knowing limits to freedom is no freedom. Freedom is the knowledge that we can act without hindrance. Freedom of mind is not total for that reason, since we might think we have no limits, yet the real fact is, the prisoner may think he is free, but he is free to think he is free, rather than free to do what he wants. He can't walk out of his prison. He can't walk out , but he may think he can. Or he may think freedom does not consist of inprisonment. But freedom is actually freedom to think or do something. Where is freedom! Freedom is free thought, and the thought seeks truth. And truth will set you free. But wahtt is the truth? The prisoner is free, if he thinks he is free, is that the truth? His truth? There is a logical problem with this argument.
Eyes in the dark': I don't believe freedom and morality are conflicting. There may be instances when our freedom is impeded by morality, but freedom is determined by different sets of moral codes in different societies. We are free to adopt morality if we want to, or if our social network forces us. Instincts can not be said to be moral, a snake is not acting out. In adherence to a moral code, it is acting that way, according to it's nature.
I don’t think I said snakes or purely instinctive entities can act ethically, I said passions can be benevolent (in advanced entities), and they can restrict the expression of reason (make reason less free), just as reason can restrict the expression of passion (make passion less free), in contention with the spirit of the OP. Ethics comes from making highly conceptual and left brain, as well as highly objective and unbiased (if such things are possible) prescriptions. making highly left brain prescriptions doesn’t make you anymore or less free, unless you identify yourself primarily with making left brain prescriptions, which would cause you to feel unfettered whilst making them, or unless you identify yourself primarily with making right brain prescriptions, which would cause you to feel fettered whilst making them. I’m talking about internal, psychological freedom here, in the spirit of the OP, not external freedom.
If you accept good and evil as choices, and then reject morality, then you see the world in a whole new light, from a whole new lens. Freedom and morality are opposite virtues. A person cannot be both good and free, or evil and free, at the same time. Freedom can only be achieved by accepting good and evil as viable life choices, and then acting with this knowledge in mind. Good does not take precedence over evil. Evil does not take precedence over good. The two are balanced. The resistance I see from you people, is a bias toward good and away from evil. This proves to me that you people define good as “freedom”.
But this actually makes you a slave suffering from resentiment. Defining goodness as freedom, or as a free choice, is slave morality.
I would think, freedom of though and freedom to act should be distinguished. You might think that it's ok to do something, and the thought that it's ok might be based on thinking on truth values of such thoughts. However the consequences of truth values acted upon is based on definitions of what the truth is. Truth will set you fee is a cliche,but pertinent here. How will it set you free? In your mind, as a rationalization or a denial of consequences? Freedom is not caused by some kind of absolute morality, but by a morality that entails it's consequences.