Are we really free, or only free to think we are free?

Question

the question can be anserwed on different levels. but lets just keep it simple. free meaning do you owe somebody? do you ansewer to somebody or something? can you live or survive without providing anything to anyone or anything. i will provide an answer in three days. you are FREE to check back. pegfly4

Answer 1

We only think that we are free. We are not truly free, until we go into the spirit world.

Answer 2

hmm I would say no one can not "owe" another from an objective sense. We answer to everything by whatever we do. You always provide everything with something regardless of your will, but this may not be something that those things want provided for them necessarily.

Outside of this i will address the concept of free will. I believe that what many people try to see free will as being is actually like them saying they perceive a round square. every decision that a human makes is either cause by something (necessarily made due to certain circumstances, or random factors, there is nothing else that I can even imagine that could possibly contribute to decision making.

Answer 3

You can never truly be free. Theoretically, you could be "free" in an anarchistic world, but there is one major flaw with anarchy: human nature. Humans have an infallible tendency to form social structures. For example, imagine that America is in a state of complete anarchy, with no government structure. In this environment, the powerful survive. After awhile, the most powerful person in the land would offer protection to other, weaker people, in exchange for services, like farming or harvesting trees, etc. This is how medieval feudal systems developed. The king was in command of his lords, the lords were in command of their serfs, and so on.

Answer 4

It depends on how you look at life. You are completely free but that doesn't mean there aren't dependencies. You can choose to work for somebody or not but you have to have some form of way to sustain yourself if you choose to live. But if you really wanted too you could choose to live in a tree instead of a house. Agan, you are always free to stop living if you decide you do not want to deal with the dependencies.

Your freedom lay in your ability to make your own decisions at every turn. But with freedom comes the consequences of those choices. That is absolute freedom. Nobody can actually force you to do anything against your will unless they physically drag you someplace or tie you down. Even then you choose to do anything beyond sitting in one place.

Answer 5

No, we are not and never will be truly "Free".
The only reason that human-beings have endured thousands of years of life is due to our formulation of community. Community sustains us and creates our ability to thrive and evolve. Simple observation of nature reveals that groups thrive. Their numbers allows for their continuation. Participants in communities exchange an unlimited number of social contracts with peers, which helps sustain themselves as well as others. If you were to be freed of those contracts and have absolutely no dependence on your surroundings you would simply be 'timeless' (for lack of a better word). You will be absorbed in nothing, needing nothing, having no reason to do anything at all. You would pose no opposing force in the universe, as you will have no "obligation" to anything. No obligation meaning, you are affecting nothing, and nothing is depending on you. Then and only then you could be considered "free". However, we live in a universe of vast and incalculable variation and degrees, so the only correct answer to your question is: "It depends on the context of the situation, and what humanity collectively defines as Free." So, there is no one correct answer as there is no one correct definition of "Freedom" unless, that is, if you take it in its truest literal form, but that would require the complete dissolution of the universe..

Answer 6

I believe that as long as the super rich are making all the money and the lower, middle and immigrant class are workin' in their fields and they are building empires and laying the money aside for their brats, then we are not free. This is a new form of slavery. Until we are financially free and have some options financially, we are not free.

Answer 7

We're not free and we will never be, not even after death. It's not only society that sets limits, but also the life to come.

Answer 8

In truth, we are not free, because we ourselves keep changing what freedom means. Therefore, we will never be truly free, because no one knows what it means to be truly free.

Answer 9

we are free to think we are free. everyone says "o we live in a free country" "we are lucky we are free" but no body is really free. its hard to explain but im sure of ot.

Answer 10

as far as being able to think how we want to think and worship the way we want or not and go where we want to go, we are free.... if you have to work for a living and punch someones clock and do want they say to pay your bills, then no you are not free...