Freedom of thought is under attack – here’s learn how to save your mind

Freedom of thought stands at a critical crossroads. Technological and psychological advances may very well be used to advertise free thought. They could shield our inner worlds, reduce our mental biases, and create latest spaces for thought. Yet states and corporations are forging these advances into weapons that restrict what we expect.

To lose freedom of thought can be to lose something uniquely human. We share our basic emotions with animals. But only we will step back and ask “do I need to be indignant?”, “do I need to be that person?”, “couldn’t I be higher?”.

We can reflect whether the thoughts, feelings and desires that bubble up inside us are consistent with our own goals, values and ideals. If we agree they’re, then this makes them more truly our own. We can then act authentically.

But we can also conclude that some thoughts that pop into our heads are a force aside from our own. You sit all the way down to do your work and “Check Facebook!” flashes through your mind. Did that thought come from you or from Mark Zuckerberg?

Freedom of thought demands dignityenables democracy, and is an element of what makes us an individual. To safeguard it, we must first recognise its enemies.

Three threats to freedom of thought

The first threat comes from advances in psychology. Research has created latest understandings of what influences our thoughts, behaviours, and decision making.

States and corporations use this information to make us think and act in a way that serves their goals. These may differ to ours. They use this information to make us gamble more, buy moreand spend more time on social media. It may even be used to swing elections.

The second threat comes from the appliance of machine learning algorithms to “big data”. When we offer data to corporations we allow them to see deep inside us. This makes us more vulnerable to manipulation, and once we realise our privacy is being compromised, this chills our ability to think freely.

The third threat comes from a growing ability to decode our thoughts from our brain activity. Facebook, Microsoftand Neuralink are developing brain-computer interfaces. This could create machines that can read our thoughts. But creating unprecedented access to our thoughts creates unprecedented threats to our freedom.

These advances in technology and psychology are opening the doors for states and corporations to violate, manipulate, and punish our thoughts. So, what can we do about it?

The law can save us

International human rights law gives the appropriate to freedom of thought. Yet, this right has been almost completely neglected. It is infrequently invoked within the courtroom. We must work out what we would like this right to mean so we will use it to guard ourselves.

We should use it to defend mental privacy. Otherwise conformity pressures will impede our free play of ideas and seek for truth. We should use it to forestall our thoughts being manipulated, either through psychological tricks or through threatened punishment.

And we should always use it to guard thought in all of its forms. Thought isn’t just what happens in our heads. Sometimes we expect by writing or by doing a Google search. If we recognise these activities as “thought” then they need to qualify for absolute privacy under the appropriate to freedom of thought.

Finally, we should always use this right to demand that governments create societies that allow us to think freely. This is where psychology can assist.

Preventing manipulation

Better understanding our minds can assist protect us from manipulation by others. For example, the psychologist Daniel Kahneman distinguishes between what we could call “rule-of-thumb” and “rule-of-reason” considering.

Rule-of-thumb considering involves effortless and ancient mental processes that allow us to make quick decisions. The price of this speed could be mistakes. In contrast, rule-of-reason considering is a slow, consciously controlled process, often based in language. It takes longer, but could be more accurate.

This suggests that creating speed bumps in our considering could help improve decision making. Clicking unthinkingly on content or adverts from corporations doesn’t allow us to exercise freedom of thought. We wouldn’t have time to work out if our desires are our own or those of a puppet master.

We must also change our surroundings into one that supports autonomy. Such an environment would allow us to create our own reasons for our actions, minimise external controls like rewards and punishments, and encourage alternative, participation and shared decision making.

Technology can assist create such an environment. But whose responsibility is it to implement this?

Taking motion

Governments must help residents learn from a young age about how the mind works. They must structure society to facilitate free thought. And they’ve an obligation to stop those, including corporations, who would violate the appropriate to freedom of thought.

Corporations must play their part. They should state freedom of thought as a policy commitment. They should perform due diligence on how their activities may harm freedom of thought. They may very well be required to declare the psychological tricks they’re using to try to shape our behaviour.

And we the people must educate ourselves. We must promote and support free-thought values. We must condemn those turning considered one of our species’ biggest strengths, our sociality, into considered one of our biggest weaknesses through the use of it as a method of knowledge extraction. We must vote with our feet and wallets against those that violate our freedom of thought.

All this assumes that we would like freedom of thought. But will we? Many of us would literally reasonably electrocute ourselves than sit quietly with our thoughts.

Would lots of us also prefer governments and corporations do our considering for us, serving up predictions and nudges for us to easily follow? Would lots of us be blissful for freedom of considered limited if it led to increased security? How much do we would like freedom of thought and what are we prepared to sacrifice for it?

Simply put, will we still wish to be human? Or has the pain, effort and responsibility of considered one of our signature abilities, free thought, turn out to be an excessive amount of for us to bear? If it has, it’s neither clear what’s going to turn out to be of us nor clear what we are going to turn out to be.