Critical mindsets are based on freedom as a corner stone for freeing man from blind obedience to ready set orders. It's to be organized not irresponsible, ( John Hogan 2005, p 97) it's being precise not excessive, the type of freedom that provides the suitable environment to prosper innovative and creative thinking that has nothing to do with accusing others of being non-believers, sin committers, betrayers, blackmailers, or accusing them of exercising marginalization or exile, a type of freedom ( Dana Kay Nelkin 2011, p 36) that would grant individuals liable choices without any external pressure or authoritative command, where obstacles are overcome to reach tangible and theoretical achievements. Man was born free; accordingly he should be fully aware and responsible for his choices. Freedom is a natural right, not in need for further evidence or proof, as it is an original part of the human structure, but at the same time it doesn't mean to contradict reality or losing disciplines, it stops once it confronts others' freedoms, as pointed by Voltaire. It is self reforming as evident in the right of expression, movement, making living, ( Edward Peters 1989, p 341 ) transportation and showing opinion. It's also a group reformer in seeking liberty from suppress, exploitation, control and oppression as that exercised by occupying forces upon a certain country or state. It is the free will that is based on man's making of his own choices concerning life, deciding destiny, acceptance and refusal, a freedom that deals with reality in a rational way, where we find responsible interaction and obedience for laws in return for acquiring man's right in possession, opinion and decision, according to John Luke.
Freedom is the only appropriate surrounding that enables thinking, interaction and guarantees social development. All efforts are in vain if society is not freed as whole, from sectarianism, partisanship, tribal alliances and all other secondary affiliations to remain adhered to the basic and effective belongingness, the state.
Tyranny and absence of freedom had its dire impact upon scientific action in Europe, where the church controlled most of the scientific and intellectual activities, imposing strict supervision upon thinking and innovation, setting the crime of being a disbeliever as a ready allegation against those who care to think, to the extent that trials were set against any attempts in the direction of change(paul Ehrlich 2000, p395) . The most eminent victims then were, Copernicus, Galileo Galileo, who was forced by the authority of the court to state that earth doesn't turn around itself, and Isaac Newton for his gravity theories and laws.
We have to keep in mind that the mental prison machinery is also rooted in the social conditioning of economic living chances, i.e. I mean the landlord's game of monopoly. A free society would be free from monopolies, privileges and inherited wealth. The scientific method can surely help us to be more free individuals and to create human societies with higher degrees of freedom of choice.' The truth will win in the end, but we are still at the beginning'. (Zarko Petan, 1927-2014).
Dear Colleagues,
Good Day,
Blind obedience is a sure sign of trouble. The likelihood of religion becoming evil is greatly diminished when there is freedom for individual thinking and when honest inquiry is encouraged.
---- Charles Kimball
"Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth." ― Albert Einstein
I think it is a kind of primitiveness, either to be free person or slave.
Liqaa
It is not a dilemma but a paradox and thus rather than 'either-or' frame , it would be better to address 'both-and' to manage the paradox effectively as done in case of flexibility framework.
Dear Dr. Liqaa and Colleagues,
Good Day,
I do not agree with you her but even though I DO respect your opinion!!
Please, see the attached Proverb:
A sincere men is obedient and a faithful men is unfree; a 'molecular' cloning of both would make the perfected unfree human being. We are free to act according the eternal ethical laws of our creator and to choose the path of righteousness, i.e. neither sincere obedience nor pure faith can free us from learning 'spiritual physics' or to escape from our duty to rectify our ethical obligations to the human fraternity. The Proverbs are a great piece of human wisdom literature, inspired by the eternal and creative upper force. This ethics is already imprinted in our soul at birth, but we have to uncover it by the long-suffering circuit of study and action, called human history.
Dear Ismael.
What follows are some important quotations about freedom.
(1) "You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man's freedom.You can only be free if I am free" (Clarendon Darrow, People v. Lloyd, 1920).
(2) "There can be no real freedom without the freedom to fail" (Eric Hoffer, The Ordeal of Change).
(3) "What stands if freedom fall?" (Rudyard Kipling, For all we have and are).
(4) "Those we deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves" (Abraham Lincoln, letter to H. L. Pierce et al., April, 6, 1859).
(5) "A nation may loose its liberties in a day, and not miss them for a century" (Montesquieu, De l' esprit des lois)
(6)" Like bone to the human body, and the axle to the wheel, and the song to a bird, thus is liberty the essence of life. Whatever is done without it is imperfect" (Jose Martí, quoted by William Pfaff, The New Yorker. May 27, 1985).
(7) "Those men and women are fortunate who are born at a time when a great struggle for human freedom is in progress" (Emmeline Pankhurst, My Own Story)
(8) "Caged birds accept each other, but flight is what they long for" (Tennessee Williams, Camino Real).
All this quotations show that freedom is at a complete variance with blind obedience, and how much valuable one's freedom is.
History is full of examples that show us how much it is dangerous and disastrous to advocate and follow blind obedience. Holocaust is a telling example. Note also that innovators and creators were those who looked, for instance, for the unknown, the true, the good and the beautiful. Innovators and creators never accepted ready-made or established truths, that is, truths imposed on them from outside. All of them were guided, say, by the force or power of reason, not by the reason or power of force of authoritarian figures
Best regards.
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