From: "Mark Hessey" 


Bill Lucy  wrote: I'm not really sure that as
individuals we are capable of determining whether we are free. Do you think
you have the tools to do it?

The first thing involved in that determination is ditching the
"tools" and realizing that all the props are illusionary in the
equation as well.

Many people measure their freedom in dollars - or rather the ability to do
what they want because of dollars in hand, but is the man sitting on the
veranda sipping Johnnie Walker Black delivered by a houseboy any more free
than that houseboy? Perhaps, in his mind he is, but that would only be
coincidental to his circumstance. He is no more likely to truly experience
freedom than the houseboy, indeed he may have built so much filtered
viewing into his existence that he will never reach the freedom the
houseboy may have already achieved.

I'd wager that many who have been imprisoned over the centuries in attempts
to stop their ideas from spreading, are/were freer in their jail cells than
many who took no such stance but kept silent to remain free or avoid
ridicule and remain on the hypothetical veranda they built around
themselves. Still others with or without "means" remain free
within or without totalitarian governments, because they are free in their
thoughts and not burdened by temporary external laws and regulations that
many consider to be evidence of a lack of freedom.

Mark

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5