September 8, 2022

Interview with Emerson: Independent Thinking 💡

Is it possible to think for ourselves? Or Is everything we think just a remix of what we’ve consumed?

The transcendentalist philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson, believes that everyone has the ability to think independently, and that it’s the best way to live.

In the following dialogue, I talk to Emerson about the challenges and benefits of independent thinking.

(If you want to read this in a browser, or share it, here's the link: https://dkb.show/post/independent-thinking)

DKB: Is independent thinking even possible? It seems like no matter what we do, we always end up copying the things we’ve seen and heard to some degree.

Emerson: If it isn’t possible for humans to have original ideas, then how do you think we ever invented anything in the first place? How do you think we got here?

The progress of humanity is the result of the few individuals who thought independently, and were bold enough to share those thoughts.

Caesar lived his truth, and for centuries after we had the Roman Empire. Christ lived his truth, and millions of people now grow and learn from his genius.

An institution is the lengthened shadow of a single individual. All of history resolves itself easily into the biography of a few bold and earnest people.

You’re always going to be better at being yourself than copying others. Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare, Newton, or Franklin?

Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Genius is always the enemy of excessive influence. 

We all have a unique way of thinking, as brave and grand as Moses or Dante, but different from all who came before.

The definition of genius is believing that what is true for you in your private heart, is true for everyone else.

DKB: Fair enough, independent thinking must be possible for some people. Most of us struggle to do it though.

Maybe it’s something that only a few people have the talent for, which is why these influential figures are so rare.

Emerson: You’re wrong. You have this ability too, just like everyone else. It’s a part of what it means to be human.

The essence of genius is what we call instinct or intuition. We call this primary wisdom “intuition”, while all later teachings are “tuition”. All ideas have a common origin in this deep force, the last place that analysis cannot go beyond, the indefinable first cause.

We live in the sea of an immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth, and organs of its activity. When we come up with original thoughts, we do nothing ourselves, but allow a passage for this universal intelligence.

The one thing of value in the world is a free, sovereign, and active soul. Everyone is entitled to this. Everyone contains it within them, but in almost everyone it’s obstructed and unborn. The active soul sees the truth and speaks it.

DKB: I don’t know…if we all supposedly have this ability, then why is it so hard for most people to do it?

Emerson: It’s hard because society doesn’t want you to do it. All of the pressure around you pushes you away from thinking for yourself, and towards conformity.

Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the free thought of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which members agree, in order to better be able to secure bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater.

The virtue in most request is conformity. The world doesn’t want realities and original thinkers, but traditions and obedience. They look upon nonconformists with displeasure and distrust. The outrage of the masses has no deep cause, it is turned on and off as the wind blows and the newspaper directs.

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion. It is easy in solitude to live after our own. But the great person is one who in the midst of a crowd can perfectly maintain the independence of solitude.

DKB: Well of course society wants us to conform. If we didn’t conform, we wouldn’t have much of a society would we?

At the same time, like you mentioned, it’s the crazy independent thinkers who help us make progress. And we could all probably benefit from some amount of independent thinking.

If I want to live like this, how do I even begin to overcome all of the societal pressure?

Emerson: Stop living based on the expectations of the people around you. Gather your family, friends, and anyone else whose opinions you care about, and who pressures you to live a certain way, and tell them this:

“Until now, my focus has been on fitting in and conformity, but from this moment forward I only care about the truth. From this moment on, I obey no law but the eternal law. I will still support my family and friends, but I have to maintain these relations in a new way. I have to step away from your customs, and your ideas of how I should live. I must be myself. I can’t break myself any longer for you. If you can love me for what I am, then we will all be happier.”

As an independent thinker, you have to get used to having haters. You have to be willing to look like an idiot, and be misunderstood. Many great thinkers weren’t appreciated until after they were dead. So you may have to spend your whole life being ridiculed, until one day in the future, people see the truth of what you were saying.

You have to exchange the pleasure of going along with current trends, for the pain of uncertainty.

At the same time, once people do realize the value of your work, many will love and adore you. They’ll celebrate you because you held on to your ideals.

As they say, you’re crazy until you succeed, then you’re a genius.

DKB: I feel like taking such a bold stand requires some level of conviction in your thoughts and beliefs. And I don’t have that kind of conviction.

I’m always learning new things, and sometimes I change my mind. It seems better not to go around sharing your crazy ideas if you can’t be fully confident in them.

Emerson: Consistency is the other terror that scares us from trusting our own ideas. We have a reverence for our past words and acts. Other people have no data to understand us except our past acts, and we don’t want to disappoint them.

But why drag on the corpse of your memory in fear of contradicting something you’ve said before? And so what if you contradict yourself? What difference does it make?

We should bring the past into the present for judgment, and live in a new day.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. Speak boldly what you think now, and tomorrow speak boldly what you think tomorrow, even if it contradicts everything you said today.

DKB: That sounds like a foolish way to live. If you keep boldly changing your mind, then no one’s going to listen to you anymore. 

No one will understand what you actually believe.

Emerson: Is it so bad to be misunderstood? 

DKB: Sounds bad to me.

Emerson: Pythagoras was misunderstood.

DKB: Pythagoras was legitimately insane.

Emerson: Socrates, Jesus, Galileo, Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that has ever lived has been misunderstood. 

To be great is to be misunderstood.

DKB: Why would anyone trust a word out of your mouth if you change your mind all the time?

Emerson: If you live authentically, then your ideas and actions will still be harmonious in the long term, even if they seem inconsistent in the short term. It will be clear that one thread unites all of your thoughts and actions.

It will be like the voyage of a ship that goes in a zigzag line. If you look at the line from a sufficient distance, it straightens itself to the average tendency. Over time you’ll have a clear trail of progress that led you to your current viewpoint. 

DKB: So you’re saying that if we’re on the path to some truth, it will all converge eventually, even if it seems like we’re changing our mind a lot? 

That sounds somewhat reasonable…though I still wouldn’t want to be changing my mind in public that much.

Anyway, there’s one thing I’ve been wondering about when it comes to your idea of independent thinking. Do you think there’s any benefit to studying the past?

As in, do you think we should learn what came before, and build on top of it in new and original ways? Or are you saying we should start from scratch?

Emerson: People are far too reliant on books. They start their thinking from accepted dogmas, not from their own principles.

Why do we worship the past so much? The centuries are conspirators against the sanity and authority of the soul. People are too timid these days. They don’t dare to think for themselves, but rather quote some old sage.

Instead of original thinkers, we have the bookworm – the book-learned class who values books more than nature and the human constitution. This is bad. This is worse than it seems.

A well used book is great, but a misused book is the worst. What is the right use of books? They are for nothing but inspiration.

Of course there are exceptions to this, like science, where you need to learn and build on top of what came before to some degree.

But in general, relying too much on books means you’re looking backward, but genius always looks forward. The eyes of man are set on his forehead, not his hindhead.

DKB: I don’t know about that. I understand that we need to think for ourselves, but we can still learn a lot from books and old ideas.

Emerson: Just like no air pump can make a perfect vacuum, no artist can entirely exclude the conventional, local, and perishable from their book. No one can write a book of pure thought that can be as efficient to future generations as to contemporaries.

Each age must write its own books. Or rather, each generation must write the books for the next.

DKB: Or we can translate the thoughts of older generations into a language that the current generation can understand. That’s what I’m trying to do here with this blog at least.

Anyway, this seems like a good place to end our discussion. You definitely broke my brain in a few ways. Do you have anything else you want to add before we wrap up here?

Emerson: I just want people to consider how foolish the game of conformity really is. If I know what groups you belong to, I can predict your arguments. I already know that you can’t possibly say a new and spontaneous idea. You’ve pledged yourself to only look at one side of an argument, the permitted side.

Isn’t it the biggest disgrace in the world not to be a recognizable individual, not to reflect your unique perspective, but to be a tiny piece of the mass identity to which you belong? 

I believe that humanity has been wronged. We have wronged ourselves. We have almost lost the light that can lead us back to our birthright. People of the world today are bugs, and are called “the mass” or “the herd”. 

In a few decades, things might get so bad that we only have one or two ideologies that everyone follows.

I hope we can turn this around and rid the world of conformity and consistency. Let us rebuke the smooth mediocrity of the times, and hurl in the face of mainstream thought and opinion.

Let us enter into a state of war with this society of conformity. 

Let us fight by speaking our truth.