Beliefs Aren't Facts

Taking stock of our public sphere today is a sobering exercise. Righteous indignation abounds. Everyone shouts; no one listens. The sides share one trait: the conviction that they are absolutely right and their enemies are stupid, misguided, or evil. Perhaps worst of all, their certainty makes facts irrelevant: No evidence could possibly persuade them that they are mistaken.

We understand why so many are so upset. A year in lockdown doesn’t exactly bring out one’s humanity. Having witnessed a decades-long rise in wealth inequality, dramatic changes in climate, and a new reckoning with racial and gender injustices, it’s no wonder so many have reached the breaking point.

But if we discount the practice of learning through meaningful exchange, we not only default on our obligations as citizens, we place democracy itself in peril. Democracy demands we recognize our beliefs as opinions, and opinions sometimes prove false. If we could be certain they wouldn’t, there would be no reason to embrace democracy over a dictatorship of the virtuous.

First of all, if freedom of speech and diversity of opinion aren’t protected at institutions of higher learning, where would they be? 

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