Following Philosophies to their Logical End

I’ve long thought of myself as an advocate – in varying degrees - of libertarian philosophy. I trust in human freedom, perhaps blindly, and I hate the thought of involuntarily being controlled by a puppeteer, as in the authoritarian model.

When I follow libertarian philosophy to its logical conclusion, though, I find myself displeased. Perhaps selfishly, I don’t want to live in a society with rampant violence, drug use, prostitution, poverty, urban sprawl, polygamy, and any other of many social ills that human freedom affords society the chance in which to partake. It’s true that a society that permits extreme human freedom doesn’t have these social ills necessarily, but it’s also likely that they wouldn’t be eliminated.

But what of authoritarianism? To make things “better”, I could be the authority, the puppeteer. I could decree the “perfect” society. But with no obligation to respect human freedom, I have no deterrent to not legislate for a perfectly moral society, and enforce it as I saw fit. The result might be a society that is indeed rid of terrorism, drugs, violence, etc., but where my puppets have become zombies, robbed of their freedom in the 1984esque world I’ve created.

The logical conclusion of both schools produces nothing resembling a society in which I want to live. Therefore, either:
a.) I actually ought to prefer one of these,
b.) I'm not applying something correctly, or
c.) There’s a third way I’m missing.

I’m quite probably heading out of my theological league with this next point, so I’ll try to keep it both simple and brief. Flow with me on this argument.

1.) Lucifer – then an angel - sinned against God while in heaven. (Given)
2.) Lucifer’s being an angel was not the cause of his sinful action. (Given)
3.) Ergo, humans can sin in heaven. (1 & 2)
4.) God is aware of this logical possibility. (Given)
5.) Sin is, necessarily, an abuse of free will. (Given)
6.) God created heaven. (Given)
7.) Heaven is the highest most perfect place among all creation. (Given)
8.) Ergo, in God’s opinion, perfect places maintain the possibility of sin occurring for sake of free will. (3, 4, 5, 6, & 7)
9.) By virtue of my love of God, I should mirror His thoughts, actions, and directives where possible. (Given).
10.) THEREFORE: I should prefer places that maintain the possibility of sin occurring for sake of free will.

Now, to be fair, there’s a whole other set of logic about how Earth is a fallen world v. Heaven maintaining perfection that I’m not going to even attempt a similar argument on. All that would do, though, is pave the way to justifiably apply some prudence to determining under what circumstances acts of the free will are to be banned by an earthly society. Not that they’re my only two choices, necessarily, but I’m merely trying to decide which extremely-applied philosophy ought to be preferred: the authoritarian camp, or the free will camp.

I think I have to go with the latter.

(I smell a series of blog entries coming on this topic…)