Is Freedom a matter of degree

[coberst]

Is Freedom a matter of degree

I am shackled hand and foot spread eagle on the floor of my cell. I ask my jailer everyday to set me free. Finally he compassionately sets me free.

For days I am exhilarated with the ability to freely pace about my cell. After a few weeks I begin to beg my jailer to set me free. After weeks he, being a compassionate man, sets me free from my cell.

For days I am exhilarated at the freedom to wonder about and speak with other inmates. After several weeks I begin to beg my jailer to free me and finally he relents and releases me from jail. I am overwhelmed with the sense of freedom until I, overcome with hunger and basic needs, seek some work so as to feed myself.

I find a job working on an assembly line and am exhilarated at the new found freedom. After a year I begin to seek other less strenuous and repetitive assembly line work. I wish to free myself from this robotic work I do everyday.

What is the ‘telos’ (ultimate end) of this series of ever persistent desire for freedom? Is hunger for freedom similar to hunger for food, never satiated? I don’t think so. I think the search for freedom can culminate in an ultimate and satisfying end.

Freedom, I suspect, is a search for self-determination. When we feel that we are master of our domain, when we are free to determine who we are and what we need to be our self we will have reached that ‘telos’ of freedom. I suspect this end is as unique as a finger print, it is an act of creation and can be made conscious to me only by me.

I think each of us must learn for our self what we need to secure freedom’s ‘telos’. Probably most of us find only a degree of freedom, but if we never stop looking we may continue finding more of it.

[Siegmund]

I pretty much agree with what you've spelled out. Though I might say that it could, conceivably, be satiated if you got enough freedom to let you spend the rest of your life exploring it before you felt like you were bumping against the walls again.

Didnt really seem there was a question in your post, though, despite its first sentence. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[coberst]

I think our degree of possible freedom is directly proportional to our degree of self-actualization. Self-actualization is a process of extending our horizons based upon our own unique potential. The further we can see the greater is our horizon for freedom.

Do you think self-actualization has any impact on the nature of freedom?

[tame_deuces]

I hate the term self-actualization. Not because it is a bad word, but because self-help books stole it and made a mockery of it.

I dunno, you may have a point. But its weird...these days I have a job where I basically get to say what my job is, and I often find I miss the military or working in industrial production where stuff was more streamlined. Not that I'm unhappy with my career, it is looking great. But its complex sometimes.

[Philo]

[ QUOTE ]

When we feel that we are master of our domain, when we are free to determine who we are and what we need to be our self we will have reached that ‘telos’ of freedom.

[/ QUOTE ]

"The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained liberation from the self." -Einstein

[FortunaMaximus]

Nice quote. He's basically right.

Remove telos and embrace infinite regression and you should find that liberation you seek.

[madnak]

You might find Plato's story of the cave (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_cave) to be interesting, coberst. Personally, I don't feel I can speculate on an "ultimate end" until I get there, but I like Einstein's quote. I think the Buddhists are also pretty good at maximizing the sense of freedom.

[coberst]

Self knowledge is the essence of self-actualization. Freedom and self-actualization feed upon one another. The more freedom we have the more likely we are to self-actualize and as we do we gain more freedom. They share a symbiotic relationship.