CHAPTER 4

THEORIES
OF
FREEDOM
 FREEDOM

As the absence of internal restraint in the

performance of an act or in making a choice.
 Determinism
 Indeterminism
 Alternativism
Fate (Fatalism) – natural power which has complete
control over every individual’s life and destiny. In
Filipino thought, lahat ng bagay ay itinakda ng
tadhana, kung kayat ang kapalaran di man hanapin,
dudulog, lalapit kung talagang akin.
 DETERMINISM

 Is a philosophical school of thought which states that man is

not free but is determined in his actions and decisions. “ Hindi
malaya ang tao sapagkat lahat ng kanyang gawain at desisyon,
sampu sa kanyang pagkatao, ay nakatakda na”.
 Nature and Nurture, Genes and Society are the factors which
made an individual what he or she is and cause him to act the
way he does.
 One’s thoughts and actions are the effects of causes over
which a person has no control.
 The notion that one is free is really an illusion. Hence, those
who believe they are really free are victims of self-deception.
1. SOCIAL DETERMINISM
Sociocultural determinism states that every
individual is born in a given society which has its own
culture. It molds the individual into what and who he is
and will be.
An individual is the product of his own culture in as
much as he has been fashioned and sculpted by culture.
The individual is a prisoner of his own beliefs and
culture because his sense of values, behavioral and
thinking modes have been determined by sociocultural
factors and influences.
2. HISTORICAL AND ECONOMIC DETERMINISM
According to Karl Marx that the material conditions of
existence determine the views and ideologies of people (such as
religion, politics, and ethics) rather than their thought and will.
“ It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being,
but, on the contrary, it is their social existence that determines
their consciousness”.
History, person’s ideas, culture of society
(religion, politics, and morality) are determined by the material
conditions of his existence.
Marx maintains that freedom consists in the knowledge
of this materialistic condition and the ability to use this
knowledge in attaining one’s goal.
 Economic means of production exercise a great
influence on all other levels of life. These economic
means and conditions of production determine man’s
action, decisions, and valuations. They necessitate
man to act and to decide. (ex. freedom to work)
Necessity and freedom permeate each other
inextricably. For instance, an individual in his action o
freedom of movement, but in this freedom there is
necessity.
 INDETERMINISM

 Claim that man, to a certain extent, is free. Freedom is here

understood as freedom of the will or freedom of choice. “Kalayaan
ng pagpili”.
 Experience attests to the fact that you cannot force another person
to will in accordance with your own wishes; or, perhaps you may
force a person to do your bidding, but you cannot force him to will
to do it, to do it willingly. “Maari mong pilitin and isang tao na
sumang-ayon sa iyong ninanais, pero laban pa rin ito sa kanyang
kalooban”.
 Rational persuasion, rather than violence or coercion, is the
method which must be employed to gain another person to will
according to your own decisions.
 We have to assume that man is free in order to account for personal
responsibility. Unless an individual enjoys freedom of action, we
cannot hold him morally responsible for his action.
 Psychologist’s Theory – The proponents of freedom of choice
or free will argue that the Threefold phase in carrying out an
act or decision indicates that there is freedom:
1. Before the act, we are conscious that we deliberate about the
reasons in favor of or against a definite action; unless our
will is free, this deliberation is absurd;
2. During the decision, we are conscious that we are giving our
consent freely, and so we perform our actions with great
caution, realizing we are assuming responsibility;
3. After the decision, we are aware that we could have made a
different decision or another course of action, and we blame
or praise ourselves alone for any regret or credit accruing
from the action.
 JEAN – PAUL SARTRE

 Advocates of indeterminism were William James and Jean-Paul

Sartre.
 The Dilemma of Determinism – attempted to convince us that
greater subjective satisfaction and more rationality are to be found
on the side of free will.
 Depicted the human being as freedom (pour soi).
 Man perceived as pour soi, is condemned to be free, because there is
no God – according to Sartre.
 There is no such thing as God-given essence or nature of man,
insofar as man alone has to create himself and develop his own
essence through freedom. “Ang tao mismo ang lilikha sa kanyang
sarili at huhubog sa kanyang pagkatao sa pamamagitan ng
kalayaan”.
 The high price that every individual has to pay for being free is to be
responsible for the consequences of one’s own actions, as well as for
one’s own life and destiny.
 JOHN McTAGGART

Four Kinds of Freedom

1. Freedom of Self-Determinism – means that one is free to do
anything which nothing but his own nature prevents him from
doing. “Malaya kang gumawa ng anumang alinsunod sa iyong
kalikasan”.
2. Freedom of Self-Direction – an individual is capable of
directing his own life and destiny according to his own choices
and plans.
3. Freedom of Self-Realization – means that an individual is free
to develop his own nature and to realize himself. “Malaya kang
humubog sa iyong kalikasan at magpaunlad sa iyong sarili”.
4. Freedom of Indeterminism or Free Will – means that man is
free in any action even if he decides according to a certain
motivation. Motivation is not incompatible with freedom.
 ALTERNATIVISM

ERICH FROMM
This theory attempts to reconcile determinism
and indeterminism, insofar as man is both determined
and not determined, or both free and not free.
“Parehong itinakda at hindi itinakda, malaya at hindi
malaya ang tao”.
Freedom is closely bound up with his concept of
 Incestuous bonds or ties
 Incestuous fixation
 Incestuous symbiosis
 PREDESTINATION

• Also known as religious or theological determinism.

• Predestination claims that there exists an all-powerful or
omnipotent God who has complete dominion over man’s life and
destiny. This God is so powerful that he created the world out of
nothing. The whole world and everything in it, down to the minutest
detail, are absolutely dependent on God for existence and
character.
• John Calvin – stressed the omnipotence, sovereignty, and
righteousness of God. He also taught that man cannot be saved
without God’s grace. Without God’s grace everything we do is evil
and therefore determined.
• Martin Luther – Agreed with Calvin that it is not within man’s
power to do any good thing. Even actions which otherwise be right
and proper, such as acts of charity, are, in Luther’s view, without
merit if not accompanied by faith and prompted by grace.
 ST. AUGUSTINE

 St. Augustine also known as Aurelius Augustinus, argued that man

enjoys freedom of action, because if not “ God’s precepts themselves
would be of no use to man, and so that by performing them he
might obtain the promised rewards”.
 In Augustine’s view, such biblical precepts as for example, the Ten
Commandments would not have been given unless man had a will
of his own by which to obey the divine commandments. Explicit in
his line of thinking is thus the fact that God’s laws indicate the
existence of human freedom.
 But why has God given man free choice of will, despite knowing the
dismal consequences of this freedom? In Augustine’s perception,
man has been given the gift of free choice so that he can do and
perform what is right.
 In other words, unless man is free, he cannot bring forth the good
and the right which consists in the due maintenance of justice by the
condemnation of sins and the honoring of good deeds.
 MARCUS CICERO

 Marcus Cicero and Stoics taught that God’s foreknowledge

destroys man’s free will. He argued that “the foreknowledge of
future things being once conceded, fate follows as so
necessary a consequence that it cannot be denied”
 We can by no means escape doing that which is foreknown.
For if all future events have been foreknown, they will happen
in the order that they have been foreseen.
 In the same vein, though God, according to Augustine, knows
how we are going to will in the future, it does not mean that
we do not voluntarily will anything.
 God knows from all eternity all events which occur; he knows
them, as necessary if they are so, and he sees them as
voluntary if they really are. He knows all events that will take
place because they will happen; they do not happen because
he knows them.