Can you indicate what some of these "natural" desires are? Keeping in mind that we're distinguishing between need and desire. I'm asking after having spent a fair amount of time gratifying so-called natural desires, only to finally recognize they weren't really natural in the first place. But who knows, perhaps you're the wiser of us. Examples for the terminally curious: a Zenith El Primero Chronograph, the cost burning my wrist so that I eventually sold it back for what I paid for it. Or exotic steel for a hunting knife, finally learning that a basic 1075 - 1095 carbon steel is best for most people and most applications, and a whole lot less expensive. — tim wood
Following on with Arendt's strategy, is one free to not do as one desires? Or are we subject to the tyranny of desire? A somewhat facetious question, but it indicates that it is not clear what freedom consists in, in the way Garrett Travers supposes, — Banno
There is a tension, is there not, between your actions being the result of the superior-pattern-processing of your brain, and your actions not being the result of coercion? Aren't you constrained to act as your superior-pattern-processing dictates? — Banno
I never had or have any use for a chronograph, having already proved to myself they're useless for their intended nominal purpose as accurate timers. — tim wood
The basic idea is that the concept of freedom is only meaningful relative to its negation. — frank
Yes, as I said, it depends on how you define 'will'. So, since the idea has no clearly definitive, unambiguous application I agree it is fraught. — Janus
Yes, as I said, it depends on how you define 'will'. So, since the idea has no clearly definitive, unambiguous application I agree it is fraught.
— Janus
Which was, among other objectives, the point of Arendt's essay. — Paine
Is it worth using a mental concept of a thing which we can't agree what it is, since it escapes definition and description; I think it's more embarrassing than not. — god must be atheist
If Arndt was talking about a thing which she herself admits can't be described properly, then how come she makes such clearly delineated claims about it, which would necessarily presuppose what she is talking about? Which even Paine claims is not the case: "(the concept of will is fraught) Which was, among other objectives, the point of Arendt's essay." — god must be atheist
Some philosophers here are not lovers of wisdom, but haters of truth. The refusal to respond to my earlier arguments also serves this opinion. — god must be atheist
You both missed the point and evaded the question. I had no "natural" desire for those things. I was in thrall to a desire. That is, wrt those things, I was far from free. And I and no doubt you and almost everyone else have bought things we neither needed nor ultimately wanted, but had been persuaded somehow to want, with the means and opportunity to get. And while all of that can have its pleasant side, I find nothing of freedom of any kind in it. — tim wood
I don't think will is something that seeks a definition that determines it. It seeks a definition that describes it. — god must be atheist
Much of the confusion here seems to be mistaking "Are you free to act against your own will?" for "Are you free to act against your own desire?". This is ↪Agent Smith's error, along with ↪Metaphysician Undercover and ↪god must be atheist.
Arendt's point here is that "it must appear strange indeed that the faculty of the will whose essential activity consists in dictate and command should be the harborer of freedom." In doing so she shows the tyranny of following one's will, and hence that will is contrary to freedom. The will, therefore, cannot be the source of freedom. — Banno
So one can't wish for something without deciding and moving to obtain it? I desire chips, but I've not the will to get up and go to the shop.I fail to see a difference between will and desire. — Agent Smith
SO do you agree that the freedom is not found in the will alone, but requires a public space?Arendt is right — Agent Smith
So one can't wish for something without deciding and moving to obtain it? I desire chips, but I've not the will to get up and go to the shop. — Banno
SO do you agree that the freedom is not found in the will alone, but requires a public space? — Banno
We are accustomed to regarding freedom as primarily positive—the freedom to do or have something; thus there is the freedom of speech, the freedom to pursue happiness and opportunity, or the freedom of worship. But now the situation is shifting. Especially in the current economic and political crisis, the flipside of liberal ideas of freedom - namely, freedom of corporations from any form of regulation, as well as the freedom to relentlessly pursue one’s own interest at the expense of everyone else’s—has become the only form of universal freedom that exists: the freedom from social bonds, freedom from solidarity, freedom from certainty or predictability, freedom from employment or labor, freedom from culture, public transport, education, or anything public at all.
These are the only freedoms that we share around the globe nowadays. They do not apply
equally to everybody, but depend on one’s economic and political situation. They are negative freedoms, and they apply across a carefully constructed and exaggerated cultural alterity that promotes: the freedom from social security, the freedom from the means of making a living, the freedom from accountability and sustainability, the freedom from free education, healthcare, pensions and public culture, the loss of standards of public responsibility, and in many places, the freedom from the rule of law.
As Janis Joplin sang, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” This is the freedom that people in many places share today. Contemporary freedom is not primarily the enjoyment of civil liberties, as the traditional liberal view has it, but rather like the freedom of free fall, experienced by many who are thrown into an uncertain and unpredictable future.
A definition that describes it would be a definition that determines it(s nature), would it not? — Janus
I doubt it because the existence of others and their goals is what limits our individual freedoms in realizing our own goals. You also have the goals of different groups coming into conflict.If you prefer. One thesis of the article is that, as a result of this, freedom has it's being in the shared space in which we live rather than in the privacy of what one wills. — Banno
Or just stop using the vague term, "will" and say that one had the choice to eat chips and the choice to not eat chips. Once the choices were compared to other factors like being too tired or not, one choice wins out over the others. It's really no different than nested IF-THEN-ELSE statements.So one can't wish for something without deciding and moving to obtain it? I desire chips, but I've not the will to get up and go to the shop. — Banno
SO do you agree that the freedom is not found in the will alone, but requires a public space? — Banno
Much of the confusion here seems to be mistaking "Are you free to act against your own will?" for "Are you free to act against your own desire?". This is ↪Agent Smith's error, along with ↪Metaphysician Undercover and ↪god must be atheist. — Banno
Arendt's point here is that "it must appear strange indeed that the faculty of the will whose essential activity consists in dictate and command should be the harborer of freedom." In doing so she shows the tyranny of following one's will, and hence that will is contrary to freedom. The will, therefore, cannot be the source of freedom. — Banno
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