In his seminal essay “Two Concepts of Liberty,” Isaiah Berlin categorized freedom into positive or negative liberty: “freedom to” or “freedom from.” He provided a powerful critique against the metaphysical nature of positive liberty, arguing that it is oppressive, in contrast to the conception of negative freedom, defined as lack of interference. Meanwhile, conversations around the concept of freedom in Daoist philosophy often hover around categorizing it as either positive liberty in its spiritual form—what Berlin (...) calls the “retreat to the inner citadel”—or a type of negative liberty, being free from society’s interference. In this work, I argue that it may instead be more fruitful to explore the Chinese commentarial tradition for two reasons: (1) the problem of Berlin’s liberalist framework is problematic due to its inherently Anglo-European context, and concurrently, (2) there have been rich discussions of the sociopolitical aspects of the _Zhuangzi_ 莊子, especially by its leading Chinese commentator G uo Xiang 郭象, which have not been accounted for. Drawing from G uo Xiang, I render a reading of the concept of “free and easy wandering” (_xiaoyao_ 逍遙) in the _Zhuangzi_ as it directly relates to self-realization (_zide_ 自得) and having no heart-mind (_wuxin_ 無心), which makes for a more holistic understanding of freedom as self-determination. In particular, I argue that freedom in the philosophy of the _Zhuangzi_ can be more aptly understood as “freedom in,” which is more viable and just than both “freedom to” and “freedom from.”. (shrink)

The more the number of people who live on Earth grows, the more significant are the cuts individuals must accept in realization of their own freedom, so as not to limit the freedom of others. With the growing population on the finite planet the real space for freedom of each individual decreases. Moreover, the growth of complexity of the global industrial civilization increases the degree of interdependence on one hand, on the other the degree of mutual trust (...) decreases as a result of the imperative of growth and profit, and without it no human society can function in the long term. Access to sources necessary for the realization of fundamental freedoms is unequal, and, in fact, it thus limits its accessibility for the majority of human population. Philosophical reflection then should cope with question, whether the range of guaranteed freedoms can be broadened or at least sustained when the space for its realization with the growing human population struggling for increasingly limited resources narrows. (shrink)

I defend a necessary condition of local autonomy inspired by Aristotle and Marx. One does something autonomously, I argue, only if one does it for its own sake and not for the sake of further ends alone. I show that this idea steers an attractive middle path between the subjectivism of Dworkin- and Frankfurt-style theories of autonomy on the one hand and the objectivism of Raz-style theories on the other. By doing so, it vindicates and explains two important pieces of (...) common sense of which those theories struggle to make sense. First, it explains how external sources of compulsion, such as coercion by other people and duress by unfavorable circumstances, can compromise the autonomy of an activity. Second, it explains this by articulating the sense in which to act autonomously is to do what one really or truly wants to do, and the correlative sense in which to do something unfreely is instead to be forced or necessitated to do it. At the same time, my proposal brings into view distinctive species of external unfreedom beyond the traditional paradigm cases of coercion and duress. Most importantly, it implies that toil—labor which is not valued intrinsically but is done purely on account of its instrumental necessity—is essentially unfree. (shrink)

A moralised conception of freedom is based on a normative theory. Understanding it therefore requires an analysis of this theory. In this paper, I show how republican freedom as non-domination is moralised, and why analysing this concept therefore involves identifying the basic components of the republican theory of justice. One of these components is the non-moralised pure negative conception of freedom as non-interference. Republicans therefore cannot keep insisting that their freedom concept conflicts with, and is superior (...) to, this more basic concept. I demonstrate how we can use pure negative freedom to formulate the republican theory more precisely. This exercise is more fruitful than the common focus on the alleged conflict between the two freedom concepts. (shrink)

On expectation, most wild animals have lives of net suffering due to naturogenic causes. Some have claimed that concern for their well-being gives us reasons to intervene in nature on their behalf. Against this, it has been said that many interventions to assist wild animals would be wrong, even if successful, because they would violate their freedom. According to the Freedom-based Approach I defend in this paper, this view is misguided. Concern for wild animal freedom does indeed (...) gives us reasons to secure these animals against control-undermining interferences, but also to intervene in nature in order to enrich their choices. (shrink)

In this article, Grace Andrus de Laguna develops a view of human freedom, one according to which it is made possible by the uniqueness of human individuals and the cultural worlds in which they live.

The main purpose of this study is to examine whether God can be free in His actions according to al-Ghazâlî and Thomas Aquinas, whether their assessment on divine actions has legitimacy and internal consistency. For this purpose, in the Introduction, it was given some general explanations on the problem and some works were done about this matter are taken into consideration and evaluated. In the first part of the dissertation, I tried to analyze the concept of ‘freedom’ and its (...) relation to determinism. I also tried to give some explanations in terms of ontological and semantical aspects of the divine freedom. After these explanations, I pictured historical panorama of the problem of divine freedom and how to be understood divine actions in the historical period. In the second part of the dissertation, I tried to demonstrate how interaction took place between al-Ghazâlî and Thomas Aquinas. After this step, I took into consideration the concept of God in al-Ghazâlî and Thomas Aquinas, and I tried to give their resemblances and differences about this matter. In the third part of the dissertation, I considered their ideas about God-World relationship. In this context, I took in to consideration the issue of indicators of God’s freedom, like creation, miracles, relation between moral truths and God’s commands. (shrink)

In this article, I examine Peter Morgan's TV series The Crown (2016–present) through the lens of Sartrean and Beauvoirian existentialism. I argue that the character of Queen Elizabeth II holds a special place in the royal family, as the monarch who demonstrates the compatibility of duty and tradition with existential freedom and authenticity. I also demonstrate the series’ commitment to breaking the illusion of inhumanity that the royal family tries to maintain, by showing that the royals are not out-of-reach (...) ideals, but humans who struggle to transcend their exceptionally binding facticity. As portrayed in The Crown, Queen Elizabeth's lucidity on her situation leads to honest introspection, which dispels any attempt at self-deception, and therefore prevents her from slipping into bad faith. (shrink)

Everyday life is increasingly restructured by algorithms that participate, not only as medium, but also as partners, co-creators, mentors, and figures of authority, in our affective and creative experiences. Their agentic capacity is enabled by big data capitalism as well as through the newly acquired ability to generate meaning (text) and visuals (images, videos, holograms). AI technology engages with aspects of existence that constitute the core of what it means to be human. Promising transcendence of existential givens it induces an (...) illusory sense of safety, as it brings us even closer to a confrontation with constitutive ontological complexities. For instance, AI technology commits to a transcendence of mortality, luring humans to envision the possibility of “digital resurrection” and of acquiring immortality via a merger with machines. Seduced by the seeming omnipotence manufactured for us in the digital world, which molds itself to our wishes, we end up questioning not only our agency and freedom but the very fact of being alive. In addition, in the current epidemic of loneliness, in which inter-human connections are thinning out and our reliance on chatbots for friendship, care, and romance increases, humanity is confronted with the state of fundamental isolation and the desire for intimacy and community. This article meditates on AI technology’s tendency to colonize aspects of life that are at the core of humanity, namely meaning, freedom, death, and intimacy, as well as on the societal risks associated with fundamentally altering our understanding of these matters. (shrink)

Education as Freedom is a groundbreaking edited text that documents and reexamines African-American empirical, methodological, and theoretical contributions to knowledge-making, teaching, and learning and American education from the nineteenth through the twenty-first century, a dynamic period of African-American educational thought and activism. Education as Freedom is a long awaited text that historicizes the current racial achievement gap as well as illuminates the myriad of African American voices and actions to define the purpose of education and to push the (...) limits of the democratic experiment in the United States. (shrink)