Hayek on Freedom

Think for a minute about how progress is made. It doesn’t follow a constant, linear path. It is unpredictable. It comes in violent fits and starts. It happens at the whim and fancy of genius.

Everyday life is much the same. Life is what you make of it. You have to be free to find what’s best for you. That means making wrong choices sometimes. It means not just trial, but error. Or, as Hayek put it:

“If we knew how freedom would be used, the case for it would largely disappear… It is therefore no argument against individual freedom that it is frequently abused.”

-F.A. Hayek, The Constitution of Liberty, p. 31.