Freedom — A central concept in ethics, politics, and metaphysics. For the Stoics, freedom is internal: free is the one who governs their passions through reason. For Kant, transcendental freedom is the capacity to act according to moral law, independent of natural determinism. For Sartre, the human being is “condemned to be free”: one cannot escape choice, since even not choosing is a choice. In political philosophy: negative liberty (absence of coercion, Berlin) vs. positive liberty (capacity for self-realization).
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