NationStates Jolt Archive

I ask you people of NSG, what does the word "Freedom" mean to you?
It seems in the society I live in it's something most people aim for, but what is it?
Perhaps it means to own a little farm with your partner, to go into space, to have more control on what happens in your environment (to play God).
To me it defines a place where you can do anything you wish without restraint of economic, physical or mental ability (this sounds like some sort of heaven, but is it really?).
I doubt this would be feasible if possible at all, so why do so many people want it.#

EDIT:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_%28philosophy%29

To choose how you want to live.

lol@poll.options

I'll go with other.

freedom, n. Exemption from the stress of authority in a beggarly half
dozen of restraint's infinite multitude of methods. A political
condition that every nation supposes itself to enjoy in virtual
monopoly. Liberty. The distinction between freedom and liberty is
not accurately known; naturalists have never been able to find a
living specimen of either.

Freedom, as every schoolboy knows,
Once shrieked as Kosciusko fell;
On every wind, indeed, that blows
I hear her yell.

She screams whenever monarchs meet,
And parliaments as well,
To bind the chains about her feet
And toll her knell.

And when the sovereign people cast
The votes they cannot spell,
Upon the pestilential blast
Her clamors swell.

For all to whom the power's given
To sway or to compel,
Among themselves apportion Heaven
And give her Hell.

lol@poll.options

I'll go with other.

lol@unexpected email link

"Freeeeedom is just another word for nothing left to lose"

lol@unexpected email link

I should get that as a new email address.

*ponders*

where can I find .opti? :p That is freedom!

True freedom: Do what you want then take the consequences of having done so.

1. the state of being free or at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint: He won his freedom after a retrial.
2. exemption from external control, interference, regulation, etc.
3. the power to determine action without restraint.
4. political or national independence.
5. personal liberty, as opposed to bondage or slavery: a slave who bought his freedom.
6. exemption from the presence of anything specified (usually fol. by from): freedom from fear.
7. the absence of or release from ties, obligations, etc.
8. ease or facility of movement or action: to enjoy the freedom of living in the country.
9. frankness of manner or speech.
10. general exemption or immunity: freedom from taxation.
11. the absence of ceremony or reserve.
12. a liberty taken.
13. a particular immunity or privilege enjoyed, as by a city or corporation: freedom to levy taxes.
14. civil liberty, as opposed to subjection to an arbitrary or despotic government.
15. the right to enjoy all the privileges or special rights of citizenship, membership, etc., in a community or the like.
16. the right to frequent, enjoy, or use at will: to have the freedom of a friend's library.
17. Philosophy. the power to exercise choice and make decisions without constraint from within or without; autonomy; self-determination. Compare necessity (def. 7).

To do whatever I want, when I want without infringing the freedom or human rights of others.

freedom is to do whatever you want without restrictions so that also means to be able to kill someone

To do whatever I want, when I want
Fixed

Freedom isn't an absolute good.

freedom is an illusion.

to live my life on my own terms, free from obligations i do not choose, free to take myself where i wish and how.

I can only say one thing about freedom............Dont trust freedom when its not in your hand. Then it isnt freedom, merely an illusion

freedom is an illusion.

YOU"RE AN ILLUSION! Take that, son!:D

Freedom to me is to be able to live my life within the set confines of society and to take the responsibility of my words and actions.

harm no one. beyond that, do as your concience dictates. govornment only exists to punish those who harm others.

YOU"RE AN ILLUSION! Take that, son!:D

*fades and shows real self*:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/Wilhelm1.jpg

It was me, Kaiser Willhelm I all along.

Freedom is something you can never totally have. It's when you are free to do as you please.

To answer the title: Freedom is the ability to do what you want to do.

To answer the op (with examples like owning a farm or going to space): What often makes me feel free is the ability to quickly get at least some knowledge about almost any subject online rather then having to go through the trouble of acquiring the right magazines and books for the field in question.

To answer the title: Freedom is the ability to do what you want to do.

Let's say I put a gun to your head and say "pretend you are a chicken or you die" you will probably want to act like you are a chicken because you rather do that than dying, but you weren't free.
Or am I totally wrong?

Let's say I put a gun to your head and say "pretend you are a chicken or you die" you will probably want to act like you are a chicken because you rather do that than dying, but you weren't free.
Or am I totally wrong?
If you force me to act the way you want then you take away my freedom to act the way I want. In a choice where all options are things I'd rather not do I'll just have to pick the least bad alternative even though I don't want to.

Some would say I still have free will and the choice between those options is mine, I'll just have to face the consequences of my choice. But I don't feel free to do what I want to do (in this case I want to act like myself and still survive) if that is not one of the options. This is why laws work not always but most of the time. If someone wants to point a gun at others to make them act like chickens and face the consequences of threatening people it would be very hard for the government to take away their freedom to do so but most people want to point a gun at others to make them act like chickens and get away with it, that desire is much easier to restrict.

To be able to live my life as I wish (without harming others).

To live how I want? is this a trick question? I only ask because it would appear the answer is painfully obvious.

I feel most free when I'm walking down the middle of the road at night, strolling where traffic would normally be stuck.

I guess you'd define freedom as being free of restraint, in which case true freedom is impossible philosophically for anyone and impossible politically for everyone.

If you force me to act the way you want then you take away my freedom to act the way I want. In a choice where all options are things I'd rather not do I'll just have to pick the least bad alternative even though I don't want to.


Isn't that what people do all the time? Pick the least bad alternative out of a couple of choices that are given to us from the outside? Even if we think we really want one option, couldn't it be because we don't see the other options?
If this isn't true, wouldn't we have about 6 billion astronauts and only a handful people making sandwiches for a living?
And to the people that "want to live like they wish", how much of your wish is your own and not a result of the society in which you live, or does that make no difference?

Sorry if I'm not making sense, I just feel like arguing, it must be the exams :p

Isn't that what people do all the time? Pick the least bad alternative out of a couple of choices that are given to us from the outside? Even if we think we really want one option, couldn't it be because we don't see the other options?
If this isn't true, wouldn't we have about 6 billion astronauts and only a handful people making sandwiches for a living?
And to the people that "want to live like they wish", how much of your wish is your own and not a result of the society in which you live, or does that make no difference?

Sorry if I'm not making sense, I just feel like arguing, it must be the exams :p
The least bad alternative out of all options a person can imagine is also the most good (best) alternative they can imagine. What the best option would be is a matter of opinion. Someone else can say there was a better way that the person didn't see but the claim that the other way would have been better is just an opinion.

I think everything a person does is the result of combining everything they have received from outside factors like genes or society. Or in other words, a person is the sum of all memories they have received, gentic memories or memories of experiences of the outside world and their thoughts are the conclusions drawn form adding up that sum.

Making a decision that wasn't the best (if we assume your opinion really is better than theirs) is lack of knowledge, imagination or wisdom rather than a lack of freedom. Freedom is the ability to do it after deciding that you want to do it.

In theory on paper a lot of people may not be forbidden to become astronauts but unless they have the ability to actually do so in reality that theoretical freedom is useless and meaningless. If you put a handicapped person on an island and tell them they have permission to swim to the shore 100m away whenever they want to they still don't feel like they have freedom to leave the island because they don't have the ability to do so.

Freedom is the ability to set and achieve your own goals.

As such a big part is negative, the freedom from interference. The rest is positive: the freedom to do something. But the gag about the latter is that it depends to a huge extent on your own actions, and I see no way to change this without violating the sentence at the top. There may well be some instances where it is possible, but they're gonna be the exception rather than the rule.

I ask you people of NSG, what does the word "Freedom" mean to you?
It seems in the society I live in it's something most people aim for, but what is it?
Perhaps it means to own a little farm with your partner, to go into space, to have more control on what happens in your environment (to play God).
To me it defines a place where you can do anything you wish without restraint of economic, physical or mental ability (this sounds like some sort of heaven, but is it really?).
I doubt this would be feasible if possible at all, so why do so many people want it.#

EDIT:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_%28philosophy%29

Freedom means desirable absence. If an absence is undesirable it is called bereavement. In most contexts the thing whose absence is desirable is implied, but without context the word freedom doesn't mean very much. My cat enjoys freedom from flees.

At the time of the American Revolution "freedom" usually referred to freedom from arbitrarily wielded power. Later it came to mean freedom from distant power. Then (when 'distant' could mean "the Presidential Palace" to someone in Georgia) 'freedom' came to mean "...from foreign power."

During WWII it meant such bullshit as "freedom from want" next to a big picture of a turkey dinner.

"Freedom (from X)" is meaningless if (from X) is undefined.

"Freeeeedom is just another word for nothing left to lose"

Damn, you beat me to it!

"An it harm none, do what you will."