Man and Liberty

PHENOMENOLOGY OF FREEDOM
Pius G. Morados

Are we free or not?

“All men seem to be aware of freedom in choice.”

The universal experience of freedom provides the greatest proof for its own existence.

B.F. SKINNER, an extremely influential behavioral psychologist from Harvard seems to affirm that man is not free because: a) all present behavior is controlled by previous behavior, including the entire network of environmental, psychological, and educational stimuli which have shaped our present characters and personalities, and b) all behavior (even the dropping of a book) has motivational causes which are necessitating causes. We might summarize this basically by saying: Man is determined by his historicity.

JEAN-PAUL SARTRE’s position seems to be one of the absolute indeterminism or total freedom. In Sartre’s view man actually has no history. The individual has only his future project which he makes entirely of himself and for which he alone is responsible. Man is so free, so indeterminate, that he cannot even be defined.

ABRAHAM MASLOW offers something of a compromise position. Man cannot be reduced to his history, to his environment, to his determinism; nor can man be totally divorced from them. To be a human person means: a) to have potentialities which liberate him from blind necessity – to be able to know, question, and mould himself, and b) to be inserted into an environment and history which help him actualize these potentialities.

Phenomenological Analysis of Reflection and questioning

(We have) the ability to question, to hesitate, to achieve a distance from immediate necessity of from objects and demands presently before us.

All of us share in the ability to question our historicity and our past.

The immediate tasks at hand do not compel or force us.

We are not enslaved nor determined by our past.

(We have) the capacity to reflect upon myself, to acquire a distance from myself-as-immediately-concerned-with-the-present-stimulus.

With the distance we achieve in self-reflection, we are able to achieve at least to some extent self-possession and self-determination.

THAT IS FREEDOM!

Free Will (Freedom is for the good)

The will is an intellectual tendency, or a tendency toward an intellectually known good.

“Nil volitum quin precognitum.”

The intellect knows not only the present object as good but knows all subjects that exists as good in some way.

Everything that can be seen as good can be the object of the will.

The will is naturally determined to seek the good and its pursuit of the good always involves a choice among many particular goods all of which can be the object of its choice.

Moral failures is a question of wrong choice. The free will is a limited power and is fallible.

KNOWLEDGE AND CHOICE, INTELLECT AND WILL

There are forces which can shape and influence my present and future behavior.

There are also data which indicates that these forces do not totally destroy my ability to take possession of myself.

As long as I can question, as long as I can achieve a distance from my environment and from immediate needs and as long as I can know various values and goods as limited and conditional, I can take hold of my life and my situation and I can say something about it.

I AM FREE!

Freedom as Distance

Man’s consent to reality is never unreserved.

Man can never fully say yes to any reality

Man’s yes to the world includes also a no

Man distances himself from complete affirmation and consent

Freedom as Having To Be

Man as subject is not only a natural light but also a natural desire.

Man is a task-in-the-world.

Man is never finished.

TO DISREGARD HIS TASK IS TO DISREGARD HIS HUMANITY.

Freedom as Project

Man’s being a task involves his potentiality.

Man is a unity-in-opposition of factical being and potential being of “already” and “not yet” of past and future.

Man’s project is a project in the world.

Absolute Determinism (Burrhus Frederic Skinner)

“The hypothesis that man is not freed is essential to the application of the scientific method to the study of human behavior. The free inner man who is held responsible for his behavior is only a pre-scientific substitute for the kinds of causes which are discovered in the course of the scientific analysis. All these alternative causes lie outside the individual.”

SCIENCE AND HUMAN BEHAVIOR

Man’s behavior is shaped and determined by external forces and stimuli whether they be familial or cultural sanction, verbal or non-verbal reinforcement or complex systems of reward and punishment.

I have genetic, biological, and physical structures which influence my behavior. They are part of the total me which is involved in choosing.

I have environmental structures which are part of me – my early life and psychological development, the culture, national and ecclesiastical frameworks that I find myself situated in.

I am keenly aware of external forces and demands which impinge upon me, sometimes creating needs and even values.

CRITIQUE OF SKINNER

There are levels of experience which cannot be explained by or reduced to my historicity.

“I can make myself aware of my biological and physical limitations compensating them, channeling them, improving them.

I can question my own environmental structures; I can revolt against them or validate them.

I can achieve a distance from external demands and forces. I can hesitate, reflect and challenge them.

REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM

If we are all absolutely determined, then we all must be deluded at the very heart of our primary experience for almost all normal persons experience some degree of freedom in choosing or being able to say something about their own actions.

If all our judgments and choices are conditioned and necessitated by prior reinforcement or external stimulus, this case would have to hold true for the determinist himself.

Absolute determinism cannot serve to explain the totality of human behavior for it fails to account for the data of questioning, self-reflection and intelligent inquiry.

Absolute Indeterminism (Jean-Paul Sartre)

“I am my freedom.” –The Flies

“Human freedom precedes essence in man and makes it possible, the essence of the human being is suspended in his freedom. What we call freedom is impossible to distinguish from the being of human reality. Man does not exist first in order to be free, subsequently there is no difference between the being of man and his being free.” – Being and Nothingness

Man is the only source which decides ends, motives and causes. The influence of his historicity and facticity upon his freedom is inconsequential.

Since man’s identity as a “le pour-soi” involves consciousness and freedom as immediate givens, his existence is a resistance to his facticity.

Since freedom is involved with the future and it is man’s identity, his environment and past motivation do not hinder his freedom.

Since man chooses his own identity and makes his own essence, man is not defined by limits.

CRITIQUE OF SARTRE

The facts of experimental psychology, biology and sociology militate against the view that we are totally free of external influence, hereditary factors, environmental tugs, and normal psychophysical development.

“I am inextricably bound to who I am and who I am includes my history, my growth and the total formation of the life which I have led to these moments – as well as my ability to question, to negate, and to achieve a distance from necessity.”

To be me involves the structures of what being me is and wherever I may go or flee, I will carry myself with me.

OVERSIMPLIFICATION

To hold freedom as diametrically opposed to structure is to posit that there are only two possibilities either absolute indeterminism (total structurelessness) or absolute determinism (total structuredness)

It is to think of freedom as a negation of external imposition of binding commitments of the past and an affirmation of pure, spontaneous, unreflective and unencumbered action.

MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY

Sartre makes freedom impossible. If freedom is everywhere then it would be useless to pinpoint where freedom lies. We are free precisely when we are controlled by our situation as well as when we control it.

My freedom therefore must be a field, there must be special possibilities for me to choose.

Structure Freedom – Human Reality (Abraham Maslow)

Freedom and structure are complementary rather than contradictories.

The free man does not necessarily oppose structure.

The fact of being human gives rise to structures, values and demands which, instead of negating freedom, actually makes freedom possible and even enhances it.

Structures are not only compatible with freedom but are fundamental to all human growth, evolution, and process. Freedom is exercised only within the structure of our humanity and historicity and the vehicle by which we can remain faithful to these two.

Structures are the offerings of the human world to which come – embracing historicity, environment, the community of thought, cultural and moral heritage.

Structure is the internal constitution of being a man with human potentialities – the reason why values and demands emerge from my own identity as a questioning self, a knower, a lover.

“My own freely created life project is also a structure.

Conclusion

Value of Freedom. Through human freedom, man can possess himself and his destiny. And since his meaning and destiny is other-directed, man not only possesses himself. His freedom so constitutes man that he is never fully achieved until, having possessed himself, he gives himself to the other.

THERE IS NO ESCAPE FROM HUMAN FREEDOM.

NO MAN CAN CHOOSE TO BE UNFREE.

TO BE HUMAN IS TO BE FREE.

Sources:

“Human Freedom” by John F. Kavanaugh

Outlines on “Phenomenology of Freedom” of J. Ranilo B. Hermida