THINKER'S ALMANAC - December 16

What does it mean to think that nothing is indubitable?

Subject: Epistemology - Russell’s New Decalogue

Event:  Bertrand Russell’s essay “The Best Answer to Fanaticism - Liberalism,”1951

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts. -Bertrand Russell

On this day in 1951, British philosopher Bertrand Russell wrote an essay in The New York Times entitled “The Best Answer to Fanaticism - Liberalism.”

Liberalism, according to Russell, is not a belief; instead, it is a disposition or attitude toward belief.  He credits John Locke as liberalism’s “great apostle” because he argued that all people should be capable of living at peace and that it was not necessary for everyone to agree.  Instead, Locke argued that all opinions should be treated as fallible and any belief should be open to question.  

Russell called into question those who argue that the truth is already known.  These people hold the opposite view of liberalism because their purpose “is not to discover truth but to strengthen belief in truths already known.”

                                                                Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay 

At the core of Russell’s argument is how to approach old ideas versus new ideas.  His conclusion is that all ideas should be welcomed, but at the same time, all ideas, whether old or new, should be subject to scrutiny and debate.  To help facilitate the liberal outlook, the correct epistemological attitude, Russell ends his article with what he calls a “new decalogue,” a kind of ten commandments of epistemology, in other words, ten rules that will help bring all of us closer to the truth:

1. Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.

2. Do not think it worthwhile to produce belief by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.

3. Never try to discourage thinking, for you are sure to succeed.

4. When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.

5. Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are always contrary authorities to be found.

6. Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.

7. Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.

8. Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.

9. Be scrupulously truthful, even when truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.

10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.

Recall, Retrieve, Recite, Ruminate, Reflect, Reason:  What is the purpose of Russell’s New Decalogue?

 

Challenge - The Best of the Ten: Read through Russell’s ten rules.  Pick the one rule that you like the best, and write a paragraph explaining why you feel that the rule is important for people who are trying to find the truth.

 

ALSO ON THIS DAY

December 16, 1906: On this day in 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt wrote a letter to a friend explaining a recent political defeat.  Roosevelt, who won fame as a Rough Rider in the Spanish-American War and served two terms as president from 1901-1909, was not used to defeat.  He broke up monopolies, championed federal regulation of railroads, spurred the conservation of natural resources, and began the construction of the Panama Canal.  As the leader of the Progressive Movement, however, there was one reform that Roosevelt could not make happen:  spelling reform. In addition to being an age of reform, the 19th century was also a time when public education was being expanded and democratized in America.  Roosevelt, along with other education advocates, viewed spelling reform as a practical and economical way to improve education.  After all, English orthography is plagued with words that have more letters than necessary as well as inconsistent and capricious spelling rules. In March 1906 the Simplified Spelling Board was founded and funded by industrialist Andrew Carnegie.  Its mission was to reform and simplify English spelling.  On August 27, 1906, President Roosevelt issued an executive order that 300 words from the Simplified Spelling Board’s list of revised spellings be used in all official communications of the executive department.  Some of the examples of changes are as follows:

 

blessed to blest

kissed to kist

passed to past

purr to pur

though to tho

through to thru

 

On December 3, 1906, Roosevelt wrote his annual message to Congress using the new spelling.  He became an easy target for criticism, however, as can be seen in the following sentence from a newspaper editorial:

[Roosevelt] now assales the English langgwidg, constitutes himself as a sort of French academy, and will reform the spelling in a way tu soot himself.

On December 13, 1906, soon after it received Roosevelt’s annual message, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution rejecting the new spellings and urging that government documents be written using “the standard of orthography prescribed in generally accepted dictionaries of the English language.” At this point Roosevelt decided to surrender.  He withdrew his executive order, and wrote a letter to his friend Brander Matthews, who was also the chairman of the Simplified Spelling Board, admitting defeat:

I could not by fighting have kept the new spelling in, and it was evidently worse than useless to go into an undignified contest when I was beaten. (2)

Sources:

1-Russell, Bertrand.  “The Best Answer to Fanaticism -- Liberalism.”  The New York Times 16 Dec. 1951.

2-Thomas V.  Teddy Roosevelt, Rough Ride Over Spelling Rules. The Wall Street Journal 16 April 2015.