Heglatonic freedom

Hegel asserts that willing involves the pure thought of oneself, which is absolutely abstract, absolutely universal, by which he may mean that this thought is free of all content. Willing also involves a content, which can be given by nature or produced out of the content of the mind. Depending on which type of content predominates in the will, the will exists as free in itself or as free for itself. When the will is free in itself, the willing action is determined from outside the subject, and the opposite. when the will is free for itself, the willing action determines the subject as such. This is so because in the first case the will reflects on its needs immediately. In the immediate will its content is given by nature. Impulses, desires and inclinations get in each other’s way and the satisfaction of one impulse demands the suppression of another by the contingent decision of the will. In this case man does not act in accordance with any general principle, but he does as he pleases. The will is free to decide what it wants or prefers (in other words the will is free in itself), and as far as impulses come from outside, the actions satisfying its needs are determined from outside.

In the second case, the will does not reflect on its needs in an immediate manner, and thus, man does not act as he pleases. The will reflects on the impulses posed by nature, in other words its desires, through the comparison with the totality of satisfaction and the consequences related to it.

This way of reflection is possible when man takes into account not only what pleases him but also what pleases others. This kind of reflection invests material with abstract universality, due to the fact that the will reflects on itself through universal knowledge and norms accumulated into the social relationships. In this way thought takes charge over the natural force of the impulses and the will is free for itself, because the actions of the will are self-determined.

The difference between determinated and self-determinated actions of the will is in the degree of the development of the subject. In the first case, the subject uses the formal powers of his subjective mind, which enables him to plan his actions. Irrespective of his ability for planned actions, these actions are nevertheless determined by nature (conditions of existence), and in this way they satisfy primarily natural needs, irrespective of their social form.

In the second case, the subject has developed his formal powers of his subjective mind into the social relationships, which function as objective mind. Through this social relationship man acquires knowledge and skills, and again through these social relationships man objectifies himself, creating conditions for his self- development. The will is self-determined by the content of its universal thought, and its actions satisfy primarily social needs irrespective of their biological form. Hegel’s view on free will seems to be that, free will is the will of a man who knows that the objects of his will are themselves forms of mind and not alien to it. And property is not means satisfying physical heeds but rather means for intellectual development.