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Spirit of liberty

2021-02-15

Billings Learned Hand was an American judge and judicial philosopher active in the early to mid-20th century.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_Hand

There's a quote of his that I like, a small snippet from a larger, renowned speech:

"The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right."

The complete "Spirit of Liberty" speech

There are two reasons I really like this quote. One is that its meaning isn't obvious when you first read it. Reading it in context helps somewhat. But here's how I think of it.

An ultimate - perhaps, the ultimate - effect of liberty is a free mind. You are freely able to think how you wish to. To the chagrin of many power structures in the U.S., a free mind tends towards critical thinking and independent observation and assessment of the goings-on in the world.

The polar opposite of this liberty is an enslaved mind, one which is not just forbidden to think in certain ways, but which is unable to. There's a direct line from this idea to the concept of thoughtcrime from Orwell's 1984, specifically to the concept of crimestop, the instinctive rejection of arguments that contradict those in power.

"Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought. It includes the power of not grasping analogies, of failing to perceive logical errors, of misunderstanding the simplest arguments if they are inimical to Ingsoc, and of being bored or repelled by any train of thought which is capable of leading in a heretical direction. Crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity." -- Emmanuel Goldstein

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thoughtcrime

Sound familiar? Remind you of any entities in the American political system today? This concept explains well the paradox that controlling, cult political movements can preach freedom, and their thralls buy it. They think that they are at liberty, but they have lost the ability to continually reconsider their stances, logically or otherwise. The minds of the followers of the movements were lured in with the gateway drug of "American values", and once they were mentally hooked, those minds could be warped into other ways of thinking.

To truly have a free mind, to possess the spirit of liberty, as Learned Hand asserts, would be to doubt, to be unsure, whether your way of thinking is "right". It feels scientific to me: all your theories of how the world works are just that, theories, and subject to continual reassessment. You have to be brave to feel this way, because your world could come crashing down if you are "wrong". Fear of this is part of what keeps people in political cults. How embarrassing, how socially devastating. You'll be cast out, shunned, alone. Crimestop protects you, instead.

Political gatekeepers keep their flocks in line by devastatingly calling out those who change their minds as "flip-floppers". You didn't just evolve your thinking and grow, no - you are a hypocrite, spineless. Most political figures, who need popularity to attain and preserve the power they crave, can't withstand that assault. And those in their political movements go along with the attack, because if that person is wrong, and I look up to them, then I'm in danger of agreeing with them, and I'll get attacked too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip-flop_(politics)

And so, political movements constrict themselves around dogmas without any coherent guidance. There's your team, and the other team who is everyone else. That's one, two parties. Superficially, it all seems tidy and balanced, but beneath the surface, there's not a lot of liberty left in thoughts and actions.

How to avoid this doom personally? The Learned Hand quote is the prescription: Never be too sure that you are right. To paraphrase what he continues on to say: seek to understand the minds of others, weigh your interests against theirs, consider the least along with the greatest. It's risky work, but worth it for your own sanity and clarity of thought.

So, the other reason I like the quote is that I happen to agree with it, although, of course, I'm not too sure of that.