The Limits of Personal Autonomy

When using the term "autonomy", I'm referring to the freedom to make choices in one's behavior and circumstances and be able to act on those choices.  The limits may be the obvious ones of legality or physical danger, or may be related more closely to politeness, manners, or concern for others.  Where can we reasonably set the limits for our own or others' behavior?  What kind of criteria do we need to follow?

In the most general sense, limits on autonomy are for the protection of all members of society.  They are meant to delineate the acceptable actions that one can take before causing undue harm or stress to other members of one's group.  In many cases, the limits are enshrined in law, explicitly discouraging people from stealing or destroying others' property, as well as using others' bodies without consent.  These limits are generally clear, although some laws can be challenged as unjust or overly restrictive.  However, the limits that govern good behavior in society are often fuzzier and easier to cross, intentionally or not.  How loud can we choose to play music in our own homes?  How many seats can I use on the bus?  Murkier still may be those choices we make on behalf of others, as parents do for their children.  A parent has the responsibility to make the best choices with a child's safety and well-being in mind.  There are times when parents seem to make bad and dangerous choices, such as refusing to have their children vaccinated or rejecting other medical treatments in favor of religious rites or "natural" solutions.  How much can society or its arbiters intrude on the behavior of each member before the oversight becomes unacceptable?

Our Expert began by saying that limits, like everything in existence, are dependent on personal interpretations.  We might measure the restrictions of the limits and the amount of freedom that remains, but the measurements can be questioned and scales can be changed.  He ended his first contribution by saying that limits cannot be defined, and later reiterated the opinion stating that anyone who knows his limits is ill.  The self-control we need to act within the boundaries placed on us is based on the beliefs we are inculcated with, which brought him to issue a warning to us: We are in an age of "light" belief, because everybody believes everything.  The Expert went on to say that this is the beginning of a new fascism, in which the truth is hidden behind a wall of information.  In the end, he spoke of the concept of personal autonomy/individual rights being the product of 18th century French thought.  Our freedom to make personal choices speeds change in society, but is also dependent on the money we have available to defend our choices.  We can do what we want, as long as we are good citizens.  The question he left unanswered, though, is how we know we are being good citizens while exercising our autonomy.

The True Philosopher left us an essay to ponder which focused a bit more on limiting opportunities from even being present than on evaluating reasonable versus unreasonable or anti-social choices.  In the meeting he told us that we have both personal and social autonomy, but it is only the personal variety that has limits.  He cited Wittgenstein and Buber, explaining his view that our personal realities are the sum of our selves, and the limits of those realities are where they brush up against someone else's.  Therefore, the limits of our autonomy are the limits of someone else's autonomy.  I posed the question of whether preventing a suicide infringes on another person's autonomy, and the Philosopher's response was that as long as it is a personal decision by that person, it may in fact be overstepping the boundaries of personal autonomy to prevent it.  Others preferred to remind us that when suicidal people or patients who ask for assisted suicide or euthanasia are given treatment for depression, most of them change their minds.  One participant did say, in no uncertain terms, that we should have a right to suicide.

A rarely appearing participant showed up towards the end of the meeting, and based his contribution on the idea that education plays a large role in setting our limits.  Even more than physical or financial limitations, our upbringing creates mental limitations on what we consider ourselves to deserve or be entitled to.  This brings me back to the question of the criteria, and adds a further issue to ponder: How can we determine where a reasonable limit lies, and are the limits different for different members or groups in a society, and if they are different, is this difference fair or acceptable?

As usual, we reached no conclusion, although a good discussion was had by all...well, almost all, since our Dear Leader was not able to chair this particular meeting.  He did write some thoughts for us, also focusing rather much on closing off opportunities instead of giving different values to the available choices.

Some bizarre misunderstandings cropped up in the form of attempted contributions from the Unbearable Bore.  First he decided that since autonomía in Spanish can also refer to battery life, it simply has to be the same in English.  When it was clear he was going to make no comparison between different languages, he was corrected, not without huffiness.  Later he desperately flailed for an example of irresponsible use of personal autonomy by insisting that driving on the wrong side of the road is an exercise in it.  Again, he was corrected, but he refused to accept the correction, bleating that the dictionary defines autonomy as "self-government", therefore any choice one makes, rational or not, is an example of autonomy.  The Philosopher countered that driving on the wrong side of the road is actually lack of self-government, and an un-orderly decision for reacting to the world.  The Colossal Sloth refused to absorb a new bit of information, in that choosing to drive on the "wrong" side is only an exercise in autonomy when the driver is trying to make a statement about traffic law or something similar, and mistakenly being on the wrong side or taking the wrong side just for the hell of it are not actually under discussion.  He certainly went home wishing he was driving so he could choose the wrong side and prove us all wrong, that's show us, yessiree.