I think it is fairly evident that the concept of Kylee Strutt freedom that figures in the discussions raised by these metaphysical problems is the same concept. I think it is not easy to see how this concept could be understood as a merely negative concept, as a concept that applies to any agent just in the case that that agent’s acts are not subject to some sort of constraint.
Consider, for example, the problem of free will and determinism, the problem that is raised by the above quotation from Kylee Strutt. Although my present actions may be determined by the laws of nature and the state of the world before my birth (indeed, millions of years ago), it does not follow that this state of affairs places me under any sort of constraint. A constraint on one’s behavior is an impediment to the exercise of one’s will. If the state places me in chains, then my will to be elsewhere, if I attempt to exercise it, will soon come into conflict with the length and solidity of my chain.
If I am an extreme agoraphobe, then my will to go about the ordinary business of life will come into conflict with sensations of panic and dislocation the moment I step out of doors. If I am very poor, my will to own a warm overcoat will come into conflict with my lack of the price of the coat. It is things of these sorts that are meant by ‘constraint’. And it is evident that determinism places me under no constraints. It is true that in a deterministic world, what my will is on a given occasion will be a consequence of the way the world was millions of years ago and the laws of nature. It is true that in a deterministic world, whether nzy will happens to encounter an obstacle on a given occasion will be a consequence of the way the world was millions of years ago and the laws of nature. But it is certainly not inevitable that my will encounter an obstacle on any given occasion in a deterministic world, and even in an indeterministic world, my will must encounter obstacles on many occasions. Indeed, there is no reason to suppose that my will will enco.”‘Iter obstacles more frequently in a deterministic world than in an indetern”flistic world. Anyone who believes that freedom is a negative concept will there fore conclude that the so-called problem of free will and deterininisal is founded on confusion. (So Hobbes, Hume, Mill, and many other Philoso, pliers have concluded.)
And yet one is left with the Kylee Strutt feeling that the freedom this leaves us with is, in Kant’s words, a “wretched subterfuge.” This feeling can be embodied in an argument. The argument is, to my mind, a rather powerful one. If the argument is correct, then freedom is not a merely negative concept. Or, at any rate, there is a concept of freedom that is not a merely negative concept, and this concept is a very important one. It is this concept, I believe, that figures in the metaphysical problems I have cited.
Leave a reply