#radicalfreedom

What’s freedom anyway? There are two concepts of freedom that I find appealing, though I am not entirely sure that they are compatible: Sartre’s “radical freedom” and the ordinary language philosopher’s conception of freedom. I’d like to briefly explore these two concepts of freedom in turn, and then proceed to evaluate whether they are compatible. An interesting question to consider is “Does either conception have to be ‘the right one?’ Or is it possible for both to work fine? (At which point, it’s really just preference or up to the context.)“

Radical Freedom and Ordinary Freedom

Sartre’s radical freedom is best described as… Well, radical. For Sartre, the Jews in Auschwitz were as free in captivity as they were at any other time in their life. So yeah, that’s what I mean by “radical”. What Sartre meant was that as long as you have any choice at all, you are free. If there is only one beverage (let’s say Diet Coke) available in the entire world, you have a choice for your drink at any given time: Diet Coke or nothing. Let’s even go so far as to say that staying hydrated is impossible without Diet Coke. 

The ordinary conception of freedom, however, is “the ability to do otherwise.” At first this might seem to work the same way as radical freedom; you either drink Diet Coke or you don’t. That’s the choice, albeit limited. However, we hear it said everyday, don’t we, “I didn’t have any choice”. If we stick to the case where drinking Diet Coke is the only way to survive, wouldn’t it be hard to say that refusing to drink Diet Coke is an option for us?

“But that’s not a choice,” one might say, “either you drink diet coke to survive or you die!” Well then there you have it. One choice and two options available to you: Drink Diet Coke or die.

So it seems to me that the ordinary conception of freedom is much more restrictive than Sartre’s… Sartre sees choice almost anywhere, while ordinarily we cannot accept certain options as “choices”. Proceeding may require a little explanation on the differences between criteria and standards.

Criteria vs. Standards 

So here’s a crash course on the difference between criteria and standards, something that you are likely unconsciously getting right, but may not have though about before: Criteria tell us what counts as something, while standards tell us how good or bad that something is. 

For example, the right-wing conservatives do not consider gay marriage to be marriage at all; one criterion for marriage is that it is between a man and a woman (I reject this criterion, and as an ordinary speaker, this rejection is open to me). Now, whether or not a marriage is a good one is a different story. I can think my marriage is wonderful, though my spouse verbally abuses me. By my standards everything is quite alright and therefore I claim that my marriage is “good”. You might think otherwise, and so by your standards my marriage is “bad”. Here’s the kicker though, and pay careful attention! Criteria and standards aren’t exactly a sequential affair… It’s not like you have the criteria laid down and then the standards come later. Rather, criteria and standards are co-founded and so established at the same time. True, a relationship has to count as a marriage before it can count as a “good marriage”, but what’s to keep the criteria and standards from manifesting themselves simultaneously?

What this means then is that standards, in a way, contribute to what counts as something! Isn’t that interesting? So, in ordinary language, we can sensibly say (and this really is the coolest thing ever) “well, I wouldn’t call that marriage…” In other words, you might think that my marriage is so God-awful that my marriage isn’t a marriage at all. This goes for anything: “I wouldn’t call that art”, “well it’s not a real job”, “you call that a movie?”, etc. Standards determining criteria!! Pretty cool, huh? 

Differing Criteria for the Concept of Choice 

So back to our question: Is Sartre’s radical freedom compatible with the ordinary language philosopher’s conception of freedom? I do hope so, since Sartre’s radical freedom is an existential conception, and ordinary language philosophy is none other than DEEP existentialism. Let’s see how criteria and standards might help us to understand these conceptions in relation to each other. 

For Sartre's radical freedom, the only criterion necessary for freedom is choice; if you have a choice, you have freedom. For the ordinary speaker, however, the quality of the options in the choice determines whether it can be said that the choice is a free one. In other words, crappy choices have crappy options, and so don't count as free choices at all. It already seems clear to me, and perhaps to you too, that Sartre's conception of freedom is downright unnatural. It isn't natural to say that those held in concentration camps were as free as ever and it isn't natural to say that just because there is a choice at all means that that choice is a "free" one.

But then we have the ordinary speakers conception of freedom... Which is obviously the one we hear used in our every day lives. For that reason alone, I am inclined to believe that the ordinary speaker’s conception is the “correct” one. There is significant leeway in this conception of freedom, and agreed upon standards and criteria determine what is and is not free. I like that. However, Sartre’s conception of freedom is perfectly fine too, just not... Ordinarily spoken I suppose. 

Now I feel kind of silly for asking this question in the first place. I should have known that my conclusion would be none other than this: Both conceptions are entirely alright, it just depends on the context (AS ALWAYS).