response paper 1 PHIL 1010 Essays - Philosophy, Articles, Assumption

Suppressing False Views and Mill's Liberty Principle Santiago Arango ID:0983059 Introduction to Philosophy 1010 Professor Bromhall October 14, 2018 Mill's harm principle states that the only actions that should be prevented are the ones that directly harm other people. The harm could be that it injures them physically, infringes on their natural rights, or sets back important interests that could benefit others. It means that as long you do not directly harm others or their rights-based interests you are free to do whatever it is you like. For example, drug addiction and suicide are things that would merely offend some people without directly harming them. An offense is something Mill would say hurt someone else's feelings' These are less serious, and you should not limit someone's freedoms over it. What may offend one person might not offend another person. A better example of this is saying you are going to kill yourself, only your loved ones and people who know you will be upset and offended but that does not mean every single human on earth will react the same way. I make a clear difference in harm' and offence' to proper ly clarify the principle. Mill justifies his harm principle by pointing out that suppressing people's views can lead to dead dogmas, false claims of infallibility, and the loss of partial truths.According to Mill's formulation of the Liberty Principle, it is morally impermissible to suppress false views because "we lose a way to challenge, reconsider, and perhaps reaffirm, our true views." By suppressing those opinions, you are no longer challenging the views that are held true. "However true it may be, if it is not fully, frequently, and fearlessly discussed, it will be held as a dead dogma, not a living truth." A dead dogma is something that someone believes to be true but does not fully understand why. Censoring false views that would otherwise challenge the true views would cause harm to future generations of people as they would forget why they held those views to be true in the first place. The only argument they might come up with is "that's just how it's always been therefor e it must be true." It stops the view from being a living truth if it is not constantly challenged. Mill says, "we go to sleep at the post as soon as there is no enemy in the field." If the false views themselves are also not constantly challenged there is a chance that it will gain a popularity. A historical example of this is the Nazi party of Germany's racist ideas and antisemitism. If the government or state completely suppressed those views they might gain a following because people do not know why the views are being suppressed in the first place. Without an open discussion to continuously discredit the false views, people would no longer know why the views are false in the first place.As Wolff interprets Mill's view on knowing, "between our being certain of a view, and the view being certain. Not to recognize this is to assume infallibility." Mill is saying it is never ok to suggest that something is for certain. He uses the case of Socrates as examples of infallibility. He p erished in a society where it was assumed that the established traditions and laws could not be wrong. Socrates was tried by an honest Judge who was just doing his duties and acting in good faith. The point of the example is to show that humans can make massive errors and that we have no right to ever claim infallibility. Further examples that show this are how the earth was once thought to be flat or how Pluto was once considered a planet. There are many ideas we would recognize as being absurd today that were considered true in the past. Avoidance of infallibility is something that Mill would advocate because no view or idea can ever truly be for certain.As seen previously there can be false views that are true and the true views that are false. There is also the idea of partial truths which are statements containing some truths together with some falsehoods. There is a chance unpopular ideas and opinions might have some truths to