benefit, usually personal development or self-realisation, although Berlin defined it as self-mastery and linked it to *democracy. For Berlin the negative/positive distinction was reflected in the difference between being free from something and being free to do something. However, the ‘freedom from’ and ‘freedom to’ distinction is misleading, because every example of freedom can be described in both ways. For instance, being free from ignorance means being free to gain an education. G. C. MacCallum (1991) proposed a single, value-free concept of freedom in the form: ‘X is free from Y to do or be Z’. This suggests that the apparently deep question ‘are we free?’ is meaningless, and should be replaced by a more complete and specific statement about what we are free from, and what we are free to do.