Freedom is not a goal, but a direction

Re:Freedom is not a goal, but a direction by csee on Thursday November 18, 2021 @08:38AM (#29265197)

This covers positive freedoms, but what about negative freedoms? Contrast these two people:

- The first person lives in a prosperous and authoritarian state. They have high positive freedoms (access to resources, healthcare, etc, thanks to the bounties of their society) but low negative freedoms (no freedom of speech/thought, low freedom of movement, surveillance, etc).

- The second person is a survivalist nomad. They have access to very little resources, but otherwise have no external authority that is constraining them in a negative sense.

So I think there's orthogonal variables here, and each of them could rightly be considered to be "freedom" as it's often defined by different people.

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Re:Freedom is not a goal, but a direction by Chris2048 on Thursday November 18, 2021 @11:01AM (#29266923)

To what extent are those positive freedoms associated with the government vs the free market?

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Re:Freedom is not a goal, but a direction by csee on Thursday November 18, 2021 @11:14AM (#29267086)

My opinion is that most wealth is attributable to the market, but the government is necessary to the extent that it sets and enforces the rules, resolves disputes, and provides defence. The government does help build wealth more directly (e.g funding science research) but it is not the primary driver of it.

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