The Idea of Freedom

Ever since Protagoras brandished the philosophical motto that "man is the measure of all things," thus declaring man's personal freedom an unlimited absolute, sages and philosophers have been fascinated with the idea of freedom. Today, after some 2,500 years, the idea remains just as vital and just as fascinating.

It is not surprising that Mortimer J. Adler, who has repeatedly plunged himself into the thorniest problems of education, should tackle this ancient theme. Already as a Columbia undergraduate, Adler nagged philosophy professors by exposing certain of their contradictions, snubbed revered Educator John Dewey by spoofing pragmatism as bits of useful information at the price of wisdom. As a philosophy professor, he campaigned against universities' traditional system of departmentalization and specialization. As an author, he tried to summarize (in his The Great Ideas--a Syntopicon) the history of Western thought (to be found in the Hutchins-and Adler-edited Great Books of the Western World), to reduce man's search for wisdom to 102 basic ideas. For the last six years, as director of the Institute for Philosophical Research in San Francisco, Generalizer Adler has continued to specialize in reductions, seeking to shrink the unlimited seas of ideas into a fathomable pool of definitions. Now, in the first of two fat volumes, Adler offers the beginning of an exhaustive dissection of one of the basic 102: The Idea of Freedom (Doubleday; $7.50).

With a staff of more than 20 scholars, Adler pored-over the works of hundreds of Western thinkers, says that he has made his selection without prejudgment, lets each writer speak as a contemporary in a conversation that began with Protagoras. His avowed purpose, neither agreement nor evaluation, was to bring great minds together. The only initial agreement that he could find among them was that "they all attribute [freedom] to man and agree that it has reality and meaning in human life."

Then There Were Three. But as each of his protagonists is analyzed down to what Adler considers his fundamental position, only three basic views on freedom emerge though, within each, violent arguments may continue to erupt. The first, what Adler calls the freedom of "self-realization," relates freedom to circumstances: a man is free if he can actually live as he desires. This is the position of Hobbes, for example, who views all laws as an infringement upon freedom. The second basic definition of freedom characterizes it as an acquired state of mind, and Adler dubs those who uphold it the self-perfectionists. Epictetus, who was once a slave but considered his spirit free, would fall under this category. The third position, which Adler calls the "natural freedom of self-determination." is defined as an individual's ability to determine for himself--though not necessarily to carry out--what he wishes to do or to become. Category No. 3 varies from No. 2 since it is not a moral state of mind, but a project of action (example: existentialism). Political liberty, it turns out, is nothing more than a variant of circumstantial self-realization, since "the individual's possession of it depends on his having a certain status, bestowed on him by the state, rather than upon his having a certain state of character or mind resulting from his own moral development."

Common Ground. Though there are three basic categories of freedom, Adler writes, they are nevertheless joined through some common elements. Each involves ability, be it to act as one wishes, to will as one ought, or to "decide creatively the course of one's life or action." All aim at some "desired result." All present man as master, inwardly or outwardly, of himself. Thus, Adler concludes, in each of the three categories, "a man is free who has in himself the ability or power whereby he can make what he does his own action and what he achieves his own property."

The author's claim of impartiality might not satisfy all readers because selection itself is a judgment, and he calls favorite witnesses to the stand time and again. Nevertheless, Adler has made a bold attempt to bring one great idea into focus, and he has done the job with flair and daring, enabling readers to eavesdrop on a noble and captivating conversation.

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