Sorry I didn’t respond sooner, but I just wanted to say that I really like your distinction between liberty as a means and liberty as a goal. I don’t know if we have a way to differentiate the two types of people using our measures, but I’ll certainly continue to ponder that and maybe I’ll be able to find something interesting using your distinction in the future…thanks.

I’m not completely sure that what you mean when you say “authority” is the same as what I mean when I say “authority”. (For example, do wrap the concept of “ownership” of tangible items, or land, and of one’s own body into the concept of “authority”? What I’m writing below assumes you don’t.) But let me offer a comment that might give you a bit of insight.

I have heard it claimed once that people who self-identify as “libertarian” are a union of two main groups. Group #1 is the “liberty as a goal” types. And group #2 is the “liberty as a means” types. (I think there is probably some truth to this claim. And maybe what you are seeing in the data is a result of there being these two principal components in the people who self-identify as “libertarian”.)

To elaborate a bit more, people who call themselves “libertarian” in group #1 do not accept any notion of authority in any way. To them, no matter what the moral question is, authority doesn’t matter/exist. For them, taxation is theft. A police arrest is an act of kidnapping. Etc. For them, the ends never justifies the means. They apply morality only to actions, and do it in a class-less way. (I.e., a person’s classification — like being a solider, a police officer or a judge — does not change the moral judgment of their action.) To them liberty is their goal. (And they have a very hard, precise, and immutable definition of what “liberty” means. I.e., the absence of (physical) coercion.)

To further elaborate, people who call themselves “libertarian” in group #2 see a tiny tiny amount of government as a necessary evil, and will thus only accept authority (in the form of government) when they see that evil as necessary. (I.e., they accept only a tiny tiny amount of government for things they believe must be done but could not be done any other way.) What they want is to set up tiny experimental independent societies (with their own rules, norms, laws, etc) and to have these compete each other in a Darwinian (although no violent) way. People would then be free to move between these competing societies and in a way “vote with their feet”, and in that way, (at least partially) decide the (Darwinian) “fitness” of a competing society by which of these competing societies they decide to live in.

I should point out that my observation is that these groups aren’t completely separate though. For example, people in group #1 do sometimes recognize that libertarianism can have the nice effect of facilitating this cultural evolution, but only accept it as long as everything is done in a voluntary way.

(If you found that useful, and would like any of that elaborated on, feel free to ask.)

P.S.
It would be really nice if you could add a “Preview Button” to them commenting form.

2)think about this as the opposite of the Jost/Thorisdottir fear effects; fear makes people more conservative. Maybe gratitude and fear are pushing the same mental lever in opposite directions. perhaps the next study should have a gratitude, fear, and neutral condition?

With one more study that sheds light on mechanism, i think you have a paper.

jon