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‘Freedom and Desire’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2020

Richard J. Arneson
Richard J. Arneson*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA92093
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Extract

Muddles can be instructive. The clarifying confusion to be examined in this paper is Isaiah Berlin's intelligent vacillation on the issue of whether or not the extent of a person's freedom depends on his desires. Is the amount of freedom an agent possesses determined solely by his objective circumstances or is it also partly a function of his subjective tastes and preferences? In clarifying this question I shall suggest that Berlin has trouble answering it because he almost perceives that interpersonal cardinal measurement of freedom, if possible at all, is possible only on a subjective basis. Yet as Berlin eloquently reminds us measuring freedom according to a subjective metric generates paradox. Whether commonsense ideas of freedom are consistent and reasonable is not purely an academic issue, for we do often make political judgments to the effect that one or another policy, or a movement to one or another form of society, can be expected to reduce or enlarge human freedom. If freedom is not measurable these judgments are merely hortatory.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , September 1985 , pp. 425 - 448
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1985

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References

1 Berlin, Isaiah ‘Introduction’ and ‘Two Concepts of Liberty,’ in Four Essays on Liberty (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1969), ix-lxiii and 118-72.Google Scholar Further references to this book are given in parentheses in the text.

2 But see the text under section (VII) below.

3 The example in the text is a variant of one used by P.H. Partridge to urge a similar point in ‘Freedom,’ in Edwards, Paul ed., The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 3 (New York: Macmillan Publishing and the Free Press 1967), 223.Google Scholar

4 A possible alternate basis for distinguishing options is degree of perceptual dissimilarity. For example if we take photographs of Smith's thumb-wiggling options, he and we will have difficulty distinguishing one from another. Whereas if Smith has to choose between walking in the Grand Canyon, trekking over Arctic wastes, and strolling along a Paris boulevard, he and we will readily distinguish these options even if he is as utterly uninterested in their differences as he is in the differences among various thumb gestures. Yet the walking options might seem significantly distinct options that do enlarge Smith's freedom, whatever his desires. But perceptual dissimilarity doesn't begin to be a generalizable criterion. Writing a check for $1 is from many standpoints perceptually indistinguishable from writing a check for $1,000,000. Section (IV) below suggests another way of handling the walking/wiggling examples.

5 That this question is not merely rhetorical is shown by the example of mean kinetic energy. But anyone who thinks freedom is measurable on a macro- but not on a micro-level owes us an account of how this is so.

6 Gray, John ‘On Negative and Positive Liberty,’ Political Studies, 28 (1980) 507–26;CrossRefGoogle Scholar see esp. 521.

7 Joel Feinberg, ‘The Interest in Liberty on the Scales,’ in A.I. Goldman and J. Kim, eds., Values and Morals (Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel 1978), 27. The next quote in the text is from 28.

8 Mill, J.S. On Liberty, in Collected Works, vol. 18, Robson, J.M. ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1977), 265.Google Scholar

9 Elster, Jon ‘Sour Grapes,’ in Sen, Amartya and Williams, Bernard eds., Beyond Utilitarianism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1982), 227–8.Google Scholar Elster's phrase ‘being a free man’ leaves it unclear whether he is talking about freedom as a social benefit one might receive or as a desirable character trait one might achieve.

10 Rousseau, Jean Jacques The Social Contract and Discourses, tr. Cole, G.D.H. (London: Dent, Everyman ed. 1963), 16.Google Scholar

11 This formulation is an attempt to improve on the characterization of the distinction between freedom and autonomy in my ‘Mill versus Paternalism,’ Ethics, 90 (1980) 470-89; see esp. 475-7.

12 For this criticism, see Cohen, Marshall ‘Berlin and the Liberal Tradition,’ Philosophical Quarterly, 10 (1960) 216–27;CrossRefGoogle Scholar see esp. 221-4; and Parent, W.A. ‘Some Recent Work on the Concept of Liberty,’ American Philosophical Quarterly, 11 (1974) 149–67;Google Scholar see esp. 149-52.

13 Harman, Gilbert argues that sometimes one can choose one's desires directly, in ‘Practical Reasoning,’ The Review of Metaphysics, 29 (1976) 431–63;Google Scholar see esp. 457-63.

14 Gray, 521; also 515. See also William Connolly's argument to the effect that extant socialist conceptions of positive freedom fail to warrant the judgment that the contented slave ‘who thoroughly internalizes the slave mentality is thoroughly unfree,’ in ‘A Note on Freedom under Socialism,’ Political Theory, 5 (1977) 461-72; see esp. 464.

15 I assume here something like the usual contrast between freedom and incapacity or inability. So far as my freedom goes, my desire to swim is satisfiable in a situation if nothing prevents me from satisfying that desire except my own inability to swim. I rely on the freedom/capacity contrast but find it problematic. Compare Smith's freedom and mine in two cases. Smith is very much stronger than I am, and has quicker reflexes. Park rules being liberal. he and I are equally free to climb El Capitan, but I lack the ability to do so. Now suppose the highwayman brandishing a knife says to each of us, ‘Your money or your life.’ My freedom is restricted; I am forced to hand over my money. By virtue of his personal endowments, Smith can disarm the highwayman effortlessly, costlessly, at no risk to himself, without suffering moral qualms. His freedom is not restricted by the threat; he is as free to do whatever he wants with his money after the threat as prior to it. Let us suppose the very same differences in our capacities explain why Smith, unlike me, is able to climb and to remain free under the highwayman's threat. In each case the external circumstances we face are identical. In one case incapacity is properly said to affect the amount of freedom an agent has, but not in the other. What explains this asymmetry? Note also that the desire thesis commences a slide away from the stance of denying that internal constraints affect one's freedom. If my desires affect the extent of my freedom, why not likewise my degree of self-knowledge, the extent to which I am tangled by neurosis, and so on to my other capacities? On this point see Taylor, Charles ‘What's Wrong with Negative Liberty?’, in Ryan, Alan ed., The Idea of Freedom: Essays in Honour of Isaiah Berlin (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1979), 175–93.Google Scholar

16 Feinberg, 29

17 I owe this point to G.A. Cohen.

18 I borrow this notion of ‘echoing’ from Bennett, Jonathan ‘Morality and Consequences,’ in McMurrin, Sterling ed., The Tanner Lectures on Human Values (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press 1981), 63–4.Google Scholar

19 Taylor, 183. Taylor's aim is not to defend ‘this quantitative conception of freedom’ but to show that it ‘is a non-starter.’

20 It might be thought that no plausible objective evaluation will assign negative values to any option, for the option if unwanted need not be taken. But this thought is mistaken. One might be tainted by considering an option. Or unwanted options might clutter one's deliberations, as when there are too many competing brands of laundry soap.

21 Mill, J.S. Utilitarianism, in Collected Works, vol. 10, Robson, J.M. ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1969), 234.Google Scholar For a counterargument, see Charles Taylor, ‘The Diversity of Goods,’ in Utilitarianism and Beyond, 129-44.

22 I thank G.A. Cohen for criticism of an earlier draft of this paper.