Alternative Conception of Human Freedom

The relationship of human liberty to both external nature and human inner nature entails a complex knot of questions that have long been the subject of intense philosophical discussion. In the modern era, a strong dichotomy developed between these concepts in which human freedom was counterposed to an apparently determinate nature that existed as a valueless res extensa. In this article, however, the author argues for the presence and vitality of an alternative concept of human liberty, one that relies not on the ownership of property but on nature as a point outside the system of human instrumental control and as the hall of mirrors represented by collective solipsism. The author arrives at this point through careful study of the underresearched naturalistic scenes and elements in George Orwell’s highly influential 1984, drawing out the complex interconnections of nature, liberty, and fulfillment found within them. This study illustrates the usefulness of the dystopian imagination ...