Point is

The point is there are two conflicting freedoms involved.

One is the freedom of choice by potential to do that choice. The other is freedom of choice by actually choosing.

The the conflict is that they are mutually exclusive. We cannot both have the freedom of potential choice and the freedom of choosing it.


This is confusing because they are two alternatives about a single choice of two, that's why I used graph to illustrate premise 1 in the last question.

The reason we have to choose is by the first premise which by definition says that a choice has to be made in the first place. Take it or leave it examples do not function into here, but I think if we went in that route, it would just be another choice that has to be taken. Time is exclusive, as well. This all appears in freeze frames, but remember when you're on the clock in your action movie, you have got to push the red button of nuclear missiles or the green button of world peace in a flash; and the game must go on.

The reason we have to choose by the second premise is more complicated. The reason that we have to choose one or the other is definitional, sure. There are no simultaneous choices by this definition. In this way, it's more red-button green-button and less the ice cream example; you could have two flavors of ice cream at the same time, but not nuclear war and world peace at the same time.

More on premise two: you have to be able to pick one. This is where the second premise runs into trouble. This is because if you choose one, it rules out the other, sure. But alternatively, if you do pick one over the other, it takes away the freedom to do the other one.

Therefore, ironically, by premise two and premise one combined, the act of choosing takes away the potential to choose, but also the freedom to do the other one.


Afterword: This problem is obviously dependent on what we have seen as a very serious situation (nuclear war). If we put it in terms of chocolate cake and dog food, it's always easier. Choices where exclusion seems better and better, which I have previously said that I think are very much often the case, seem better and better. Choices which are by nature difficult are just that.