【金句】Friedrich Hayek - Liberty describes the absence of coercion by men. It does not assure us of...

連結

• 來源1 - x.com/thomassowell/s...

• 來源2 - The Constitution of Liberty - www.mises.at/static/...

圖中被編輯過的版本

Liberty describes the absence of coercion by men. It does not assure us of any particular opportunities, but leave it to us to decide what use we shall make of the circumstance.

自由（Liberty）指的是沒有來自人類的強迫。它並不保證我們會有任何特定的機會，而是讓我們決定如何利用現有的環境。

原書版本

It is often objected that our concept of liberty is merely negative. This is true in the sense that peace is also a negative concept or that security or quiet or the absence of any particular impediment or evil is negative. It is to this class of concepts that liberty belongs: it describes the absence of a particular obstacle-coercion by other men. It becomes positive only through what we make of it. It does not assure us of any particular opportunities, but leaves it to us to decide what use we shall make of the circumstances in . which we find ourselves.

常有人反對，認為我們的自由（liberty）概念只是負面的。這在和平也是負面概念、或安全、寧靜、或缺乏任何特定障礙或邪惡是負面概念的意義上是正確的。自由屬於這類概念的類別：它描述了一個特定的障礙——其他人的強迫——的缺失。它只通過我們如何看待它才變得積極。它並不保證我們會有任何特定的機會，而是讓我們決定如何利用我們所處的情況。