Are you a freethinker?
FREETHOUGHT, according to Wikipedia is a viewpoint which holds that beliefs should not be formed on the basis of authority, tradition, revelation, or dogma, and should instead be reached by other methods such as logic, reason, and empirical observation.
Even though freethought makes sense, the question is are you willing to be a freethinker? You might say yes, but I suspect most people won’t when the rubber hits the road.
When I was a Group HR Manager, one of the HR assistant’s father had passed away. And now there would be 13 days of post-funeral protracted rituals – a tradition that has been going on forever.
Before the days of social media, the only way for people to know someone had died was from death announcements on the radio. And I am sure many people in that village were happy that they would now get free kava for the next 13 nights or 16.
It can be quite easy to give in to the temptation to do what everyone else does and to think what others believe in even if it does not make any sense. I did not want the HR Assistant, a seemingly intelligent girl, to fall into this trap. So I asked her if these rituals made any sense. She agreed they did not.
As a matter of fact, it was a great inconvenience and a financial burden for her. She had just lost her father. Now she had to ensure that there was kava and dinner every night.
After the guests left, she had to clean up. She would go to sleep in the early hours of the morning and when she came in to work the next morning, she was like a zombie. So why do we cling so tenaciously to such mindless rituals?
Before progressing further, what does it actually mean to be a freethinker? Wikipedia further states that a freethinker is free from: “authority, confirmation bias, cognitive bias, conventional wisdom, popular culture, prejudice, sectarianism, tradition, urban legend, and all other dogmas”.
How does one become a freethinker? Does some logic or scientific fact reveal that one should be a freethinker? Freethinking is a starting point for knowledge, the building block upon which you proceed. The things you value such as logical inquiry and scientific investigation become valuable once you are a freethinker – not before.
We live in praise of empirical facts and scientific investigation. But in reality most people think that free thought is dangerous. The danger does not lie in free thought per se, rather, it is what people do with it. If we truly value critical thinking, we need to apply it to our lives.
Critical thinking should be offered as an integral part of the curriculum in high schools. Also, it is much better to receive whatever information that you want from unbiased books. If you need to know something about a subject, research it online
Evaluate why you do certain things. Are you someone who is a people pleaser? There is nothing wrong with attempting to be sociable, but you should not have to do anything that violates your best interest or moral code merely for others.
Rabindranath Tagore, wrote a poem about the hypocrisy of going to the temple - Go not to the temple to put flowers upon the feet of God, first fill your own house with the fragrance of love.
Go not to the temple to light candles before the altar of God, First remove the darkness of sin from your heart. Go not to the temple to bow down your head in prayer, first learn to bow in humility before your fellowmen. Go not to the temple to pray on bended knees, first bend down to lift someone who is down-trodden.
Which brings to mind the recent Thaipoosam celebration at the Subramaniam Temple. In Nadi. A middle-aged French couple were not allowed to go to the temple. Apparently tourists were not allowed during this particular celebration.
But there were many Indo Fijians from Australia, NZ, the US and Canada that were going into the temple. Were they not tourists? Or did this rule apply only to whites? This couple had been to India many times to visit various temples. I was stunned at this blatant discrimination. I invited them to join me for lunch – which is the only reason why I go to the temple. I have zero tolerance for the hypocrisy that goes on there.
We need to become open minded, and question everything and not mindlessly accept what others tell us to be true. The first step used by politicians, priests and other influencers is distributing questionable or biased information.
Being a questioning person does not mean that you cannot be religious; it is fine as long as you truly believe in what you claim, and are not influenced by others to espouse your beliefs.
Consider the case of Thomas Aikenhead who was a freethinker. He was a student at Edinburgh University, and was just 20 years old. During August 1696, Aikenhead was walking through Edinburgh with a couple of his friends, and remarked that the Scottish weather was so unforgiving. He wished he were in hell, where at least it would be a little bit warmer. And he was accused of blasphemy!
At his trial five fellow students testified against Aikenhead. Unable to afford to pay for legal representation, Aikenhead defended himself at the trial. He was found guilty and sentenced to death on Christmas Eve 1696.
On the day of his execution, Aikenhead made a written statement that resembles some modern defenses of the principle of free speech.
He wrote: ‘It is a principle innate and conatural to every man to have an insatiable inclination to the truth, and to seek for it as for hid treasure.”
So we have to be wary of authoritarianism which often favors power over reason. Of course, lawful and morally instituted authority should be acknowledged and respected.
But ponder on this — is it better to live in a way that makes sense or to live subjugated by the tyranny of mindless societal customs just because you want to blend in. Then we are no better than sheep – and are rightly called sheeple.
ARVIND MANI is a former teacher who is passionate about quality education. He lived in the US for 35 years and was actively involved in training youths to improve their speaking skills. The views expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of this newspaper.