While I have a passion for this integration of complementary ideas, and over the years have found many others whose heart pounds for this too, I’m quite alone in this endeavor among my peers. Those who have taken all of this seriously are long dead, and those who are alive are mostly students and friends.
As one friendly critic recently put it, living Philosophers only seem to read works by other Philosophers, and what’s more, they seem to be the only ones who read them (a fact that moved me to become certified as a philosophical counselor, if only for the sake of those who do desire an education in small-p philosophy, the one they missed out on in their Philosophy classes.)
What’s more, my colleagues from other disciplines have their own agendas, their own constellation of intellectual ancestors, most within the confines of their particular disciplines, and none seem to care what ancient philosophers, or diverse wisdom traditions, or even educational theorists have to say about the interconnections between things.
Seeing that I gave my students an article by Gatto called ‘Against Schools,’ one colleague laughed and casually remarked, “Got a better idea?”
Well, YES! At least the ancients did! Of course, few of us have learned anything of this, so hardly anyone sees what’s been right under our noses all along!
So I find myself with the challenge of communicating all this to a world that thinks it couldn’t care less. Since there is little or nothing in our education that resembles any of this, there is no inkling that we have anything to gain from what the ancients taught.
Students, in my experience, are nearly universally enthusiastic when they come to finally see and understand what they’ve been missing…but then I have the power to compel them to study it, at least by virtue of knowing there will be a test, unlike my colleagues, or anyone who might be reading this book, who will never hear the dialogue between these great teachers if they choose to put down this book. If only I could threaten pop quizzes! Instead, all I can do is hope to convince you that the test will be proctored by nature herself – for we will fail or succeed in surviving the challenges we face directly proportionate to the degree that we take to heart what our ancient betters tried to teach us.
You probably think this is an overstatement, right now, so all I can hope to do is to inspire you to read further…let your own eyes, your own life, be the judge of whether this ancient wisdom offers us the tools we all need, even to achieve our own happiness, let alone to help our young survive the ecological challenges we’ve set them up for.
So this book aims to bring these ancient voices together into dialogue, “like lines converging on a common center.” Because these ancient cultures could teach us the skills of dialectic thinking that encourage healthy discussion and argument – rather than the way most of us have learned it – which is to argue to win, rather than to understand. In the world as it stands, most couldn’t care less, it seems. I can only do my best to help them see what they’re missing - for our young will pay the price for our disinterest…if we don’t learn in time.
The lack of healthy dialogue in their education is, as it was in mine, still the norm…and any suggestion that it might be otherwise seems quite radical to those who teach as their teachers taught them. But it should be clear by now that this is the first piece of advice we ought to take from our ancient betters – how to improve the education of our young. For if we take up this process in earnest, there is a kind of progressive revelation to be experienced. And in the process, one who learns this way develops a depth of understanding, not only about these traditions, but about themselves.
And more than this, by this habit we can learn to resolve those conflicts that are created by our premature certainty, not only between religions views, cultural practices, political positions, and disciplinary perspectives, but also in our personal lives, where this anti-dialogic habit often does the most painful harm in the lack of quality in our relationships.
And yet one would be hard-pressed to find any place in the western world today where there is not a complete dearth of real dialogue. And so the book I write must aim to fill that void, and be a dialogue in itself. It must somehow consists of as many of the voices of these greatest teachers of human history as possible, those who have perspective and insight to add to this discussion and from which we each and all might learn.
And as such, it cannot help but provide a critique of the errors of our age, including our tendency to see the search for truth as a competition, as if finding one true voice allows us to deem all others wrong.
My words could never say it better than John Stuart Mill did long ago, in the Victorian age of England, second only to our own in its restrictive norms.
In his classic book, entitled simply On Liberty, Mill illuminates the value of the “remarkable diversity of character and culture” we so casually ignore.
“Individuals, classes, nations have been extremely unlike one another: they have struck out a great variety of paths, each leading to something valuable; and although at every period those who traveled in different paths have been intolerant of one another, and each would have thought it an excellent thing if all the rest could have been compelled to travel his road… [Happily] their attempts to thwart each other's development have rarely had any permanent success, and each has in time endured to receive the good which the others have offered.”
"It is this… the opinions men entertain, and the feelings they cherish, respecting those who disown the beliefs they deem important, which makes this country not a place of mental freedom. For a long time past, the chief mischief of the legal penalties is that they strengthen this social stigma. [But] it is this stigma which is really effective…"[p.38-39] The reason being that social stigmatization "enslaves the soul itself," making it more formidable than overt punishment to misjudge others, than even to punish them.
Thus, we see why, “The tendency of some to impose their will and judgments on others” Mill calls the 'tyranny of the majority' - the majority being "the most numerous or the most active part of the people." The people of any given age, under influence of habit, are accustomed to believe that everybody should be required to act as they themselves think right for themselves, and so feel justified in passing judgment on all according to their own perceived interests, thinking they have a right to punish or make life difficult for any who resist their social authority. This begins very young, reaches it’s pinnacle in our high schools, and all the while, this habit of social judgment stunts the growth of individuals by punishing them with ostracism for being or thinking differently, going against the grain of what is considered 'normal'. And because the rules of “'normality' appear self-evident and self-justifying, reasons for them are not considered necessary, making them especially insidious and difficult to change or argue against, giving them the character of a universal illusion.”
Religion too often has this effect on communities. In fact, Mill argues, too often, "the revival of religion is…in narrow and uncultivated minds, at least as much the revival of bigotry… it needs but little to provoke them into actively persecuting those whom they have never ceased to think proper objects of persecution." [p.38-39]
"[A]nd it never troubles him that mere accident has decided which of these numerous worlds is the object of his reliance, and that the same causes which make him a churchman in London would have made him a Buddhist or a Confucian in Peking."[p.22]
But the best of ancients agree:
"The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs or impede their efforts to obtain it. Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily or mental and spiritual. Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest…"[p.17] [see earlier*]
Still, while everyone is entitled to their opinion, it follows from all this that not every opinion is equal to every other. There are no privileged perspectives, but there are those that have gone through the learning process better than others, have gathered ever more perspective and depth of understanding. Seeing that ‘everything is’ and that reality is both this complex and this simple, the ancients understood that the only truth worth pursuing is the whole truth. No human being is ever perfect, as the perfect person would be all people put together, but the person who is best able to see from as many points of view as possible has a claim to be the wisest.
It is, again, Mill who makes this point best:
“On every subject on which difference of opinion is possible, the truth depends upon a balance to be struck between two sets of conflicting reasons.... He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that....nor is it ever really known but to those who have attended equally and impartially to both sides and endeavored to see the reasons of both in the strongest possible light....the only way in which a human being can make some approach to knowing the whole of a subject is by hearing what can be said about it by persons of every variety of opinion, and studying all modes in which it can be looked at by every character of mind. No wise man ever acquired his wisdom in any mode but this; nor is it in the nature of human intellect to become wise in any other manner…"
And this "is owing to a quality of the human mind, the source of everything respectable in man either as an intellectual or as a moral being, namely, that his errors are corrigible. He is capable of rectifying his mistakes by discussion and experience."[pp.24-25] The whole strength and value, then, of human judgment depending on the one property, that it can be set right when it is wrong, reliance can be placed on it only when the means of setting it right are kept constantly at hand. In the case of any person whose judgment is really deserving of confidence, how has it become so? Because has kept his mind open to criticism of his opinions and conduct…it has been his practice to listen to all that could be said against him; to profit by as much of it as was just...The steady habit of correcting and completing his own opinion by collating it with those of others...being cognizant of all that can, at least obviously, be said against him, and...knowing that he has sought for objections and difficulties instead of avoiding them, and has shut out no light which can be thrown upon the subject from any quarter--only he has a right to think his judgment better than that of any person, or any multitude, who have not gone through a similar process.”(p.25)
“So essential is this discipline to a real understanding of moral and human subjects that, if opponents of all accepted truths do not exist, it is indispensable to imagine them and supply them with the strongest arguments which the most skillful devil's advocate can conjure up.”(p.44-46)
“[T]here is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices, and truth itself ceases to have the effect of truth by being exaggerated into falsehood. And since there are few mental attributes more rare than that judicial faculty which can sit in intelligent judgment between two sides of a question, of which only one is represented by an advocate before it, truth has no chance but in proportion as every side of it, every opinion which embodies any fraction of the truth, not only finds advocates, but is so advocated as to be listened to.”(p.63-64)
"Unless opinions favorable to democracy and to aristocracy, to property and to equality, to cooperation and to competition, to luxury and to abstinence, to sociality and individuality, to liberty and discipline, and all the other standing antagonisms of practical life, are expressed with equal freedom and enforced and defended with equal talent and energy, there is no chance of both elements obtaining their due; one scale is sure to go up, and the other down. Truth, in the great practical concerns of life, is so much a question of the reconciling and combining of opposites that very few have minds sufficiently capacious and impartial to make the adjustment with an approach to correctness, and it has to be made by the rough process of a struggle between combatants fighting under hostile banners. On any of the great open questions just enumerated, if either of the two opinions has a better claim than the other, not merely to be tolerated, but to be encouraged and countenanced, it is the one which happens at the particular time and place to be in a minority. That is the opinion which, for the time being, represents the neglected interests, the side of human well-being which is in danger of obtaining less than its share. I am aware that there is not, in this country, any intolerance of differences of opinion on most of these topics. They are adduced to show, by admitting and multiplied examples, the universality of the fact that only through diversity of opinion is there, in the existing state of human intellect, a chance of fair play to all sides of the truth. When there are persons to be found who form an exception to the apparent unanimity of the world on any subject, even if the world is in the right, it is always probable that dissentients have something worth hearing to say for themselves, and that truth would lose something by their silence."[pp.58-59, "On Liberty"]
"[I]t is not on the impassioned partisan, it is on the calmer and more disinterested bystander, that this collision of opinions works its salutary effect. Not the violent conflict between parts of the truth, but the quiet suppression of half of it, is the formidable evil; there is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices, and truth itself ceases to have the effect of truth by being exaggerated into falsehood. And since there are few mental attributes more rare than that judicial faculty which can sit in intelligent judgment between two sides of a question, of which only one is represented by an advocate before it, truth has no chance but in proportion as every side of it, every opinion which embodies any fraction of the truth, not only finds advocates, but is so advocated as to be listened to. . . . “
“We have now recognized the necessity to the mental well-being of mankind (on which all their other well-being depends) of freedom of opinion, and freedom of the expression of opinion . . ."[pp.63-64, "On Liberty"]
Therefore, "precautions are as much needed against this as against any other abuse of power." "Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling…" "The disposition of mankind, whether as rulers or as fellow citizens, to impose their own opinions and inclinations as a rule of conduct on others is so energetically supported by some of the best and by some of the worst feelings incident to human nature that it is hardly ever kept under restraint by anything but want of power; and as the power is not declining, but growing, unless a strong barrier of moral conviction can be raised against the mischief, we must expect, in the present circumstances of the world, to see it increase."[p.18]
In this way, "A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury."[p.15, "On Liberty"]
That said, Mill argues that we would be wise to better understand the struggle between authority and freedom. Only by freedom of thought and voice do individuals, and by extension democracies, stand a chance of healthy development.
Toward this end, asserts what he calls the 'harm principle':
"The object of this essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used to be physical force in the form of legal penalties or the moral coercion of public opinion. That principle is that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. . . . the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to someone else. The only part of the conduct of anyone for which he is amenable to society is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign."[p.13, "On Liberty"]
For this reason:
"If the teachers of mankind are to be cognizant of all that they ought to know, everything must be free to be written and published without restraint."[p.47] For "to discover to the world something which deeply concerns it, and of which it was previously ignorant, to prove to it that it had been mistaken on some vital point of temporal or spiritual interest, is as important a service as a human being can render to his fellow creatures, and in some cases . . . the most precious gift which could be bestowed on mankind."[p.33-34]
And "as mankind improve, the number of doctrines which are no longer disputed or doubted will be constantly on the increase; and the well-being of mankind may almost be measured by the number and gravity of the truths which have reached the point of being uncontested. The cessation, on one question after another, of serious controversy is one of the necessary incidents of the consolidation of opinion--a consolidation as salutary in the case of true opinions as it is dangerous and noxious when the opinions are erroneous."[p.52-55] However, "The fatal tendency of mankind to leave off thinking about a thing when it is no longer doubtful is the cause of half their errors."[p.52-55] "Both teachers and learners go to sleep at their post as soon as there is no enemy in the field."[pp. 48-52]
This then is why both sides should always be studied, Mill concludes. Even "the most intolerant of churches, the Roman Catholic Church…at the canonization of a saint admits, and listens patiently to, a 'devil's advocate.'
“The holiest of men, it appears, cannot be admitted to posthumous honors until all that the devil could say against him is known and weighed. If even the Newtonian philosophy were not permitted to be questioned, mankind could not feel as complete assurance of its truth as they now do. The beliefs which we have most warrant for have no safeguard to rest on but a standing invitation to the whole world to prove them unfounded. If . . . we have done the best that the existing state of human reason admits of : we have neglected nothing that could give the truth a chance of reaching us…we may hope that, if there be a better truth, it will be found when the human mind is capable of receiving it; and in the meantime we may rely on having attained such approach to truth as it possible in our own day. This is the amount of certainty attainable by a fallible being, and this the sole way of attaining it."[p.26]
Therefore, "It is the duty of governments, and of individuals, to form the truest opinions they can; to form them carefully, and never impose them upon others unless they are quite sure of being right."[p.23] However, "To call any proposition certain, while there is anyone who would deny its certainty if permitted, but who is not permitted, is to assume that we ourselves, and those who agree with us, are the judges of certainty, and judges without hearing the other side."[p.27] "…it is not the feeling sure of a doctrine (be it what it may) which I call an assumption of infallibility. It is the undertaking to decide that question for others, without allowing them to hear what can be said on the contrary side."[p.29] "There is the greatest difference between presuming an opinion to be true because, with every opportunity for contesting it, it has not been refuted, and assuming its truth for the purpose of not permitting its refutation."[p.24] "To refuse a hearing to an opinion because they are sure that it is false is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty."[p.21, "On Liberty"] "If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth; if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth produced by its collision with error."[p.21, "On Liberty"]
As one friendly critic recently put it, living Philosophers only seem to read works by other Philosophers, and what’s more, they seem to be the only ones who read them (a fact that moved me to become certified as a philosophical counselor, if only for the sake of those who do desire an education in small-p philosophy, the one they missed out on in their Philosophy classes.)
What’s more, my colleagues from other disciplines have their own agendas, their own constellation of intellectual ancestors, most within the confines of their particular disciplines, and none seem to care what ancient philosophers, or diverse wisdom traditions, or even educational theorists have to say about the interconnections between things.
Seeing that I gave my students an article by Gatto called ‘Against Schools,’ one colleague laughed and casually remarked, “Got a better idea?”
Well, YES! At least the ancients did! Of course, few of us have learned anything of this, so hardly anyone sees what’s been right under our noses all along!
So I find myself with the challenge of communicating all this to a world that thinks it couldn’t care less. Since there is little or nothing in our education that resembles any of this, there is no inkling that we have anything to gain from what the ancients taught.
Students, in my experience, are nearly universally enthusiastic when they come to finally see and understand what they’ve been missing…but then I have the power to compel them to study it, at least by virtue of knowing there will be a test, unlike my colleagues, or anyone who might be reading this book, who will never hear the dialogue between these great teachers if they choose to put down this book. If only I could threaten pop quizzes! Instead, all I can do is hope to convince you that the test will be proctored by nature herself – for we will fail or succeed in surviving the challenges we face directly proportionate to the degree that we take to heart what our ancient betters tried to teach us.
You probably think this is an overstatement, right now, so all I can hope to do is to inspire you to read further…let your own eyes, your own life, be the judge of whether this ancient wisdom offers us the tools we all need, even to achieve our own happiness, let alone to help our young survive the ecological challenges we’ve set them up for.
So this book aims to bring these ancient voices together into dialogue, “like lines converging on a common center.” Because these ancient cultures could teach us the skills of dialectic thinking that encourage healthy discussion and argument – rather than the way most of us have learned it – which is to argue to win, rather than to understand. In the world as it stands, most couldn’t care less, it seems. I can only do my best to help them see what they’re missing - for our young will pay the price for our disinterest…if we don’t learn in time.
The lack of healthy dialogue in their education is, as it was in mine, still the norm…and any suggestion that it might be otherwise seems quite radical to those who teach as their teachers taught them. But it should be clear by now that this is the first piece of advice we ought to take from our ancient betters – how to improve the education of our young. For if we take up this process in earnest, there is a kind of progressive revelation to be experienced. And in the process, one who learns this way develops a depth of understanding, not only about these traditions, but about themselves.
And more than this, by this habit we can learn to resolve those conflicts that are created by our premature certainty, not only between religions views, cultural practices, political positions, and disciplinary perspectives, but also in our personal lives, where this anti-dialogic habit often does the most painful harm in the lack of quality in our relationships.
And yet one would be hard-pressed to find any place in the western world today where there is not a complete dearth of real dialogue. And so the book I write must aim to fill that void, and be a dialogue in itself. It must somehow consists of as many of the voices of these greatest teachers of human history as possible, those who have perspective and insight to add to this discussion and from which we each and all might learn.
And as such, it cannot help but provide a critique of the errors of our age, including our tendency to see the search for truth as a competition, as if finding one true voice allows us to deem all others wrong.
My words could never say it better than John Stuart Mill did long ago, in the Victorian age of England, second only to our own in its restrictive norms.
In his classic book, entitled simply On Liberty, Mill illuminates the value of the “remarkable diversity of character and culture” we so casually ignore.
“Individuals, classes, nations have been extremely unlike one another: they have struck out a great variety of paths, each leading to something valuable; and although at every period those who traveled in different paths have been intolerant of one another, and each would have thought it an excellent thing if all the rest could have been compelled to travel his road… [Happily] their attempts to thwart each other's development have rarely had any permanent success, and each has in time endured to receive the good which the others have offered.”
"It is this… the opinions men entertain, and the feelings they cherish, respecting those who disown the beliefs they deem important, which makes this country not a place of mental freedom. For a long time past, the chief mischief of the legal penalties is that they strengthen this social stigma. [But] it is this stigma which is really effective…"[p.38-39] The reason being that social stigmatization "enslaves the soul itself," making it more formidable than overt punishment to misjudge others, than even to punish them.
Thus, we see why, “The tendency of some to impose their will and judgments on others” Mill calls the 'tyranny of the majority' - the majority being "the most numerous or the most active part of the people." The people of any given age, under influence of habit, are accustomed to believe that everybody should be required to act as they themselves think right for themselves, and so feel justified in passing judgment on all according to their own perceived interests, thinking they have a right to punish or make life difficult for any who resist their social authority. This begins very young, reaches it’s pinnacle in our high schools, and all the while, this habit of social judgment stunts the growth of individuals by punishing them with ostracism for being or thinking differently, going against the grain of what is considered 'normal'. And because the rules of “'normality' appear self-evident and self-justifying, reasons for them are not considered necessary, making them especially insidious and difficult to change or argue against, giving them the character of a universal illusion.”
Religion too often has this effect on communities. In fact, Mill argues, too often, "the revival of religion is…in narrow and uncultivated minds, at least as much the revival of bigotry… it needs but little to provoke them into actively persecuting those whom they have never ceased to think proper objects of persecution." [p.38-39]
"[A]nd it never troubles him that mere accident has decided which of these numerous worlds is the object of his reliance, and that the same causes which make him a churchman in London would have made him a Buddhist or a Confucian in Peking."[p.22]
But the best of ancients agree:
"The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs or impede their efforts to obtain it. Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily or mental and spiritual. Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest…"[p.17] [see earlier*]
Still, while everyone is entitled to their opinion, it follows from all this that not every opinion is equal to every other. There are no privileged perspectives, but there are those that have gone through the learning process better than others, have gathered ever more perspective and depth of understanding. Seeing that ‘everything is’ and that reality is both this complex and this simple, the ancients understood that the only truth worth pursuing is the whole truth. No human being is ever perfect, as the perfect person would be all people put together, but the person who is best able to see from as many points of view as possible has a claim to be the wisest.
It is, again, Mill who makes this point best:
“On every subject on which difference of opinion is possible, the truth depends upon a balance to be struck between two sets of conflicting reasons.... He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that....nor is it ever really known but to those who have attended equally and impartially to both sides and endeavored to see the reasons of both in the strongest possible light....the only way in which a human being can make some approach to knowing the whole of a subject is by hearing what can be said about it by persons of every variety of opinion, and studying all modes in which it can be looked at by every character of mind. No wise man ever acquired his wisdom in any mode but this; nor is it in the nature of human intellect to become wise in any other manner…"
And this "is owing to a quality of the human mind, the source of everything respectable in man either as an intellectual or as a moral being, namely, that his errors are corrigible. He is capable of rectifying his mistakes by discussion and experience."[pp.24-25] The whole strength and value, then, of human judgment depending on the one property, that it can be set right when it is wrong, reliance can be placed on it only when the means of setting it right are kept constantly at hand. In the case of any person whose judgment is really deserving of confidence, how has it become so? Because has kept his mind open to criticism of his opinions and conduct…it has been his practice to listen to all that could be said against him; to profit by as much of it as was just...The steady habit of correcting and completing his own opinion by collating it with those of others...being cognizant of all that can, at least obviously, be said against him, and...knowing that he has sought for objections and difficulties instead of avoiding them, and has shut out no light which can be thrown upon the subject from any quarter--only he has a right to think his judgment better than that of any person, or any multitude, who have not gone through a similar process.”(p.25)
“So essential is this discipline to a real understanding of moral and human subjects that, if opponents of all accepted truths do not exist, it is indispensable to imagine them and supply them with the strongest arguments which the most skillful devil's advocate can conjure up.”(p.44-46)
“[T]here is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices, and truth itself ceases to have the effect of truth by being exaggerated into falsehood. And since there are few mental attributes more rare than that judicial faculty which can sit in intelligent judgment between two sides of a question, of which only one is represented by an advocate before it, truth has no chance but in proportion as every side of it, every opinion which embodies any fraction of the truth, not only finds advocates, but is so advocated as to be listened to.”(p.63-64)
"Unless opinions favorable to democracy and to aristocracy, to property and to equality, to cooperation and to competition, to luxury and to abstinence, to sociality and individuality, to liberty and discipline, and all the other standing antagonisms of practical life, are expressed with equal freedom and enforced and defended with equal talent and energy, there is no chance of both elements obtaining their due; one scale is sure to go up, and the other down. Truth, in the great practical concerns of life, is so much a question of the reconciling and combining of opposites that very few have minds sufficiently capacious and impartial to make the adjustment with an approach to correctness, and it has to be made by the rough process of a struggle between combatants fighting under hostile banners. On any of the great open questions just enumerated, if either of the two opinions has a better claim than the other, not merely to be tolerated, but to be encouraged and countenanced, it is the one which happens at the particular time and place to be in a minority. That is the opinion which, for the time being, represents the neglected interests, the side of human well-being which is in danger of obtaining less than its share. I am aware that there is not, in this country, any intolerance of differences of opinion on most of these topics. They are adduced to show, by admitting and multiplied examples, the universality of the fact that only through diversity of opinion is there, in the existing state of human intellect, a chance of fair play to all sides of the truth. When there are persons to be found who form an exception to the apparent unanimity of the world on any subject, even if the world is in the right, it is always probable that dissentients have something worth hearing to say for themselves, and that truth would lose something by their silence."[pp.58-59, "On Liberty"]
"[I]t is not on the impassioned partisan, it is on the calmer and more disinterested bystander, that this collision of opinions works its salutary effect. Not the violent conflict between parts of the truth, but the quiet suppression of half of it, is the formidable evil; there is always hope when people are forced to listen to both sides; it is when they attend only to one that errors harden into prejudices, and truth itself ceases to have the effect of truth by being exaggerated into falsehood. And since there are few mental attributes more rare than that judicial faculty which can sit in intelligent judgment between two sides of a question, of which only one is represented by an advocate before it, truth has no chance but in proportion as every side of it, every opinion which embodies any fraction of the truth, not only finds advocates, but is so advocated as to be listened to. . . . “
“We have now recognized the necessity to the mental well-being of mankind (on which all their other well-being depends) of freedom of opinion, and freedom of the expression of opinion . . ."[pp.63-64, "On Liberty"]
Therefore, "precautions are as much needed against this as against any other abuse of power." "Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling…" "The disposition of mankind, whether as rulers or as fellow citizens, to impose their own opinions and inclinations as a rule of conduct on others is so energetically supported by some of the best and by some of the worst feelings incident to human nature that it is hardly ever kept under restraint by anything but want of power; and as the power is not declining, but growing, unless a strong barrier of moral conviction can be raised against the mischief, we must expect, in the present circumstances of the world, to see it increase."[p.18]
In this way, "A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury."[p.15, "On Liberty"]
That said, Mill argues that we would be wise to better understand the struggle between authority and freedom. Only by freedom of thought and voice do individuals, and by extension democracies, stand a chance of healthy development.
Toward this end, asserts what he calls the 'harm principle':
"The object of this essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used to be physical force in the form of legal penalties or the moral coercion of public opinion. That principle is that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. . . . the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to someone else. The only part of the conduct of anyone for which he is amenable to society is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign."[p.13, "On Liberty"]
For this reason:
"If the teachers of mankind are to be cognizant of all that they ought to know, everything must be free to be written and published without restraint."[p.47] For "to discover to the world something which deeply concerns it, and of which it was previously ignorant, to prove to it that it had been mistaken on some vital point of temporal or spiritual interest, is as important a service as a human being can render to his fellow creatures, and in some cases . . . the most precious gift which could be bestowed on mankind."[p.33-34]
And "as mankind improve, the number of doctrines which are no longer disputed or doubted will be constantly on the increase; and the well-being of mankind may almost be measured by the number and gravity of the truths which have reached the point of being uncontested. The cessation, on one question after another, of serious controversy is one of the necessary incidents of the consolidation of opinion--a consolidation as salutary in the case of true opinions as it is dangerous and noxious when the opinions are erroneous."[p.52-55] However, "The fatal tendency of mankind to leave off thinking about a thing when it is no longer doubtful is the cause of half their errors."[p.52-55] "Both teachers and learners go to sleep at their post as soon as there is no enemy in the field."[pp. 48-52]
This then is why both sides should always be studied, Mill concludes. Even "the most intolerant of churches, the Roman Catholic Church…at the canonization of a saint admits, and listens patiently to, a 'devil's advocate.'
“The holiest of men, it appears, cannot be admitted to posthumous honors until all that the devil could say against him is known and weighed. If even the Newtonian philosophy were not permitted to be questioned, mankind could not feel as complete assurance of its truth as they now do. The beliefs which we have most warrant for have no safeguard to rest on but a standing invitation to the whole world to prove them unfounded. If . . . we have done the best that the existing state of human reason admits of : we have neglected nothing that could give the truth a chance of reaching us…we may hope that, if there be a better truth, it will be found when the human mind is capable of receiving it; and in the meantime we may rely on having attained such approach to truth as it possible in our own day. This is the amount of certainty attainable by a fallible being, and this the sole way of attaining it."[p.26]
Therefore, "It is the duty of governments, and of individuals, to form the truest opinions they can; to form them carefully, and never impose them upon others unless they are quite sure of being right."[p.23] However, "To call any proposition certain, while there is anyone who would deny its certainty if permitted, but who is not permitted, is to assume that we ourselves, and those who agree with us, are the judges of certainty, and judges without hearing the other side."[p.27] "…it is not the feeling sure of a doctrine (be it what it may) which I call an assumption of infallibility. It is the undertaking to decide that question for others, without allowing them to hear what can be said on the contrary side."[p.29] "There is the greatest difference between presuming an opinion to be true because, with every opportunity for contesting it, it has not been refuted, and assuming its truth for the purpose of not permitting its refutation."[p.24] "To refuse a hearing to an opinion because they are sure that it is false is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty."[p.21, "On Liberty"] "If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth; if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth produced by its collision with error."[p.21, "On Liberty"]