Freedom From versus Freedom To: Two Different Meanings and their Commonality


Samson Corwell

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Liberty is simply the conviction of personal independence, expanded to a populace. "Leave me alone!" Like anything precious it has to be passed on to future generations by we who are caretakers of the idea.

I think it CAN be sustained, no state is more natural to man.

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Liberty is simply the conviction of personal independence, expanded to a populace. "Leave me alone!" Like anything precious it has to be passed on to future generations by we who are caretakers of the idea.

I think it CAN be sustained, no state is more natural to man.

 

The state of nature, then and now and forever, is communal. It has become increasingly more difficult to live as a solitary hermit. I'm not denying that it could be achieved -- but rather the hardships of hermitage are plentiful, and the advantages of society are overwhelmingly attractive. This does not diminish defacto liberty. We are perpetually free to disobey, evade, and otherwise ignore constraints.

 

However, I think it's fantastic (not in a positive sense, but rather the pejorative of cartoon fantasy) to ask or demand that one's neighbors should "Leave me alone!" I have yet to see it achieved in practical reality on a city street, in a grocery store, a tiny village, a beach, or an apartment house. Defending one's liberty is never-ending toil, especially if you have a family, a job, or a flower garden.

 

In Costa Rica, I was advised to empty a magazine or two, firing into the air, when I moved in -- broadcast a little belligerence.

 

Physically confronting punks on Hollywood Blvd worked pretty well, too.

 

Minute_Man_Statue_Lexington_Massachusett

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

It's a sculpture of 'The Minuteman' in a national historic park. Re independence of mind, I'm distraught at how little of it I have, using an inherited language, driving a car not of my invention, mindful of ideas coined by others. If I put the entire original output of my life in a pile it wouldn't rise above the dust on my desk -- and I am not being modest, just truthful.

Sadly, I'm not the only mental midget on earth. UK Conservative David Cameron defending the welfare state: The prime minister received a standing ovation as he asked his party conference: "How dare they frighten those who rely on a national health service?" [bBC]

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

It's a sculpture of 'The Minuteman' in a national historic park. Re independence of mind, I'm distraught at how little of it I have, using an inherited language, driving a car not of my invention, mindful of ideas coined by others. If I put the entire original output of my life in a pile it wouldn't rise above the dust on my desk -- and I am not being modest, just truthful.

Sadly, I'm not the only mental midget on earth. UK Conservative David Cameron defended the welfare state: The prime minister received a standing ovation as he asked his party conference: "How dare they frighten those who rely on a national health service?" [bBC]

Please stop it, Wolf! Cameron's a real twit.

Using your ersatz methodology Ayn Rand herself could have said the same thing about herself.

You seem to be conflating general human progress with your personal contribution with your brainpower. They each belong on different scales, but there's no point in the weighing.

You are merely empowering self-victimhood when it's practically axiomatic in human being not to be a victim; it gums up the works. To be a victim of your own brain actually libels your brain by its own consciousness. You need to apologize to it.

--Brant

I only believe in one form of self-abuse

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

It's a sculpture of 'The Minuteman' in a national historic park. Re independence of mind, I'm distraught at how little of it I have, using an inherited language, driving a car not of my invention, mindful of ideas coined by others. If I put the entire original output of my life in a pile it wouldn't rise above the dust on my desk -- and I am not being modest, just truthful.

Sadly, I'm not the only mental midget on earth. UK Conservative David Cameron defending the welfare state: The prime minister received a standing ovation as he asked his party conference: "How dare they frighten those who rely on a national health service?" [bBC]

If we had to reinvent everything from scratch in every life we'd never acquire language or be able to communicate with anyone. Did you hope to equal the output of ten thousand years of culture and philosophy in one lifetime? "We stand on the shoulders of Giants"... yes, millions of them, unknown, nameless. I think it took 50,000 years to invent the bow and arrow. Dozens of different tools and techniques to make a bow. You've already added a thousand times more than the average person. Even your thoughtful mistakes add to progress.

Ted Keer recommended "Seeing Voices" by Oliver Sacks. What jumped out to me was the importance of language acquisition and concepts to our ability to think and reason. Great book, well worth reading, lots of thought provoking information.

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

Re independence of mind, I'm distraught at how little of it I have, using an inherited language, driving a car not of my invention, mindful of ideas coined by others. If I put the entire original output of my life in a pile it wouldn't rise above the dust on my desk -- and I am not being modest, just truthful.

Oh come on. You've never marched to your own drumbeat, taken an unpopular path, or made a judgment which alienated you from others around you? Because you knew it was right, according to reality, or your principles and vision - while not according to common opinion and morality? I'll take bets on it.

Mike answered your modesty well. "Even your thoughtful mistakes add to progress". When not to "progress", errors add to one's knowledge and one's self-knowledge.

What you raise is perhaps the biggest false alternative of all -- No Man Is An Island. Because certainly the poet was half right, half wrong. Evidently - explicitly- each of us is born to parents, family, community, society, culture, language and country. Those who lived before or we live amongst now, in their millions, has each added a pebble or rock to the mountain we stand upon. To those abstract persons all respect and admiration is due: not for their servitude to the unknown "us" - for their largely anonymous and unrecognized, selfish steadfastness to an idea.

And then, last but not least, inevitably and properly we form and find relationships with others as we go along. All to say, obviously a man is not an island.

Inescapable is our primary identity, man's autonomous consciousness - so the impossibility for one person to directly experience, to live through or for, any other individual's consciousness -- with the best will (and love) in the world. His/her life and mind is ultimately and awesomely an end in itself.

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Nobody sets off to be an artist. It falls on you like a rock, and it hurts. It hurts you financially, emotionally, morally -- you name it, art hurts. Obviously, this is has nothing to do with the Pace Gallery or the Turner Prize for Inanity. Art is the province and prerogative of imbeciles like me who can't get arrested at NEH, NEA, PBS, BBC, NYU, CBS, AFI, or anywhere else with three letters. [11 Oct 99]

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Where in hell do ideas come from? I woke up yesterday morning with a crystal-clear, bulletproof short storyline. The sun is shining in Central Park West. Mollusk P. Molever and his lovely wife Cretin are checking into the Ritz-Glucose. It's their first big splurge, the couple's anniversary holiday trip to New York. Cretin is wearing a smooth blue summer dress, smiling like a happy schoolgirl. Mollie is proud but nervous, hoping the desk clerk has their reservation and there won't be any awkwardness. Jees, Louise! Does everybody wake up like this? -- suddenly clairvoyant about a 33-year-old fictional paper salesman from Poughkeepsie named Mollie Molever? [12 Oct 99]

Read what happened to Mollie and Cretin, when they turned to a life of crime, in Flibbet.

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It's mind independence I mean, in being left alone, and "natural", guys. Millions of Daniel Boones (right?) I don't envisage or wish for - although he would have understood total independence. First cause of loss of freedom is not by Statist power, it is by the overwhelming numbers who crave the authority of the State, abet and so build it. We get what they deserve, to paraphrase Greg.

"It's your mind they want". J. Galt

It's a sculpture of 'The Minuteman' in a national historic park. Re independence of mind, I'm distraught at how little of it I have, using an inherited language, driving a car not of my invention, mindful of ideas coined by others. If I put the entire original output of my life in a pile it wouldn't rise above the dust on my desk -- and I am not being modest, just truthful.

Sadly, I'm not the only mental midget on earth. UK Conservative David Cameron defending the welfare state: The prime minister received a standing ovation as he asked his party conference: "How dare they frighten those who rely on a national health service?" [bBC]

Well, aren't you just a bundle of sunshiny. Why such a gloomy gus?

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Well, aren't you just a bundle of sunshiny. Why such a gloomy gus?

Your mileage may vary. After half a million words and a solar day of film and tape I don't think much of it was original.

"The sad truth of our time is the glory that was decadent Rome, ancient Athens, Louis XIV Paris, a great shower of wealth soaked

through to the weakest seed, you and me included."

"Let's face facts. We're living off our parents' and grandparents' savings. The public debt is a pile of IOUs held by foreign investors and government employees. At no time before in the history of our Republic have the American people produced so little and consumed so much, with the exception of WWII."

-- wolfdevoon dot com archives

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