Freedom in One Lesson

82.

On Thinking for Self

After the 2012 reelection of a president favoring dramatically expanded statism, in a race that many on the other side viewed as a crucial referendum on the future of America, the “losers” fought about what lessons needed to be learned for future success. They reached little apparent agreement beyond the importance of pointing fingers at others.

This is not the first instance of navel-gazing about how to resurrect a party’s political fortunes, but it is easy to miss a central insight about it— electoral results reflect what people demand. Until those who have no problem robbing Peter to pay Paul are convinced that expanded freedom will improve their prospects, those they elect will change in name but not in substance. The only ultimate “solution” is for enough Americans to discover or rediscover our country’s founding principles, a daunting task in a political world that has become saturated with lying and misrepresentation. But the first step in any such renaissance, as Leonard Read points out in “On Thinking for Self,” from his 1968 book Accent on the Right (Read 1968), is for people to think for themselves.

What a fearful thought—if this situation is general: a nation of people the vast majority of whom do no thinking for themselves in the area of political economy! Positions on matters of the deepest social import formed from nothing more profound than radio, TV, and newspaper commentaries, or casual, off-the-cuff opinions, or the outpourings of popularity seekers! . . .

Market demand . . . determines the kinds of persons who vie with each other for political office.

Assume a people who do no thinking for themselves. Theirs is a stunted skepticism. Such people only react and are easy prey of the cliche, the plausibility, the shallow promise, the lie. Emotional appeals and pretty words are their only guidelines. The market is made up of no-thinks. Statesmen—men of integrity and intellectual stature—are hopelessly out of demand. When this is the situation, such statesmen will not be found among the politically active.

And who may we expect to respond to a market where thinking for self is absent? Charlatans! Word mongers! Power seekers! Deception artists! . . . The worst rise to the political top. And when our only choice is “the lesser of two evils,” voting is a sham.

Now assume a society of persons who do their own thinking and, as a consequence, possess a healthy and intelligent skepticism, persons who cannot be “taken in,” hard-headed students of political economy graced with moral rectitude. The market for charlatans is dead. . . . Instead, we find statesmen of character and integrity vying for political office.

. . . Merely keep in mind that whatever shows forth on the political horizon is the response to the market, an echoing or mirroring of the preponderant mode in thinking. When thinking for self is declining, more charlatans and fewer statesmen will vie for office. . . . So, blame not the political opportunists for the state of the nation. Our failure to think for ourselves put them there—indeed, brought them into being. For we are the market; they are but the reflections!

. . . Approximately 50 per cent of those who do not think for themselves are furious with what they see on the political horizon—which is but their own reflections! And to assuage their discontent they exert vigorous effort to change the reflection. . . . As should be expected, they get no more for their pains than new faces masking mentalities remarkably similar to those unseated. It cannot be otherwise.

No improving trend on the political horizon is possible except as there is an improvement—quantity and quality—in thinking for self. Thus, it is of the utmost importance that we seriously attend to our thinking. . . .

Given the present situation, where government is recklessly out of bounds and has its hand in practically every aspect of life, the well-informed citizen is expected to know all about everything. . . . Most of these so-called national or world problems are of similar origin and nature—each one trying to manage everyone’s business but his own . . . [a] hopelessly impossible challenge. . . . No person on the face of the earth knows how to make socialism work. And don’t try! Instead, concentrate the thinking on what the principled and proper scope of government really is. This is easily within the realm of any reasonably intelligent person, and is first of all the kind of thinking for self in political economy one should cover. All else—welfare, security, prosperity—is in the realm of the free market: you to your affairs, me to mine.

Most individuals who have abandoned thinking for self in matters of political economy are unaware that they thus dry up the source of Creative Wisdom. Such wisdom as society requires does not and cannot exist in any one person . . . [but only in] your and my disparate wisdoms. . . .

There are obstacles, of course, on this path to wisdom. One is a lack of faith in an over-all wisdom representing a coalescence of tiny bits of individual understanding. . . . It cannot be seen with the eye; it can be apprehended only by abstract thinking. . . . Yet, this is the nature of knowledge in society and it behooves each of us to make the best of it.

. . . A good society cannot be developed except through the process of thinking for self. Until such introspection becomes as natural as eating and breathing, there is little prospect for the good life.

. . . Each to his own thinking! The rule, therefore, is not to take somebody else’s word for it. . . . Don’t take my word for it! Scarcely any self-anointed seer or prophet wants to go that far; but, unless he will, write him off as an intellectual authoritarian, a be-like-me god.

. . . Indeed, one who would think for himself should look not only among his contemporaries but also among his predecessors, even among the ancients, for any bits of wisdom that can be garnered. Take full advantage of one’s environment, experience, and heritage, but let each thoughtfully do his own selecting, evaluating, and reasoning.

To trust this Creative Wisdom reflects an abiding faith in self and in all free men. . . . But don’t take my word for it; think that one through for yourself.

As Read so often emphasizes, the way toward social improvement is not through forcing what one sees as improvement on others but through self-improvement. When it comes to politics, an essential aspect of such improvement is careful thinking. Read saw that without careful thinking, statism, with its alluring but ultimately undeliverable promises of something for nothing, is a virtual certainty. But, for Read, the case for individual liberty is so strong that people who really think for themselves will inevitably discover it. With each such discovery comes self-reform, and self-reform leads to reduced demands for political charlatans’ snake oil. In this way, the only kind of “social reform” that constitutes real social advancement becomes possible.