Establishment and its relation to the Appreciation of Intellect

Tradition is some system which, by some principle or principles, perpetuates acts and or notions as derived from those very principle or principles throughout the passageway of time. Establishment, or having been established, is the instance or fact of having been proved by some reason into such a secure and unconditional state of affairs. Established tradition, however, is not necessarily self-sufficient, fundamental, and self-determining, as this all-accepting condition is secure to the extent that there is the need for social trust and corroboration in the numbers. Only then is the tradition safe from external destruction and internal chaos. And so, established tradition is established only to the extent that there is social integration on the matters of principle or principles of some tradition. Tradition, led by the masses or some individuals, is preserved by the common will of its followers, binding as if it were a social contract in itself. That is, since established traditions have to be secure and unconditional, the common will must be found. And, in order to maintain this will common to all followers, a social contract is found to suspend the adherent’s natural liberty to found criticisms of the sort which dismisses the very security that some established tradition so needs. A kind of civil liberty is then arisen as all adherents are bound to some common interests and rules so that all are equal in being subject to the principle or principles of some established tradition. However, since tradition needs security to perpetuate acts and or notions derived by this very principle or principles, all traditions are naturally established by the definition on the above. In any case, so any act or notion found to be against the principle or principles of tradition is also against the civil and collective liberty of all followers, and so is defined as heresy to their common will too. In order, then, for the civil liberty of adherents be supported and freedom of the tradition to perpetuate, such heresy must be denied continued action or persistence. Punishment must be incurred to anything deemed heretical to the tradition henceforth. So, revolution in the interest of the principle or principles of the tradition is treated positively than that kind of revolution which deems some principle or principles of the tradition false. This includes physical punishments to absolute rebuttals of the sort mentioned in the name of heresy and insult. Therefore, tradition is dogmatic and intolerant to rebellions.

Anything which is established, as mentioned above, “... is the instance or fact of having been proved... into such a secure and unconditional state of affairs.” And so for anything to be established, it must also necessarily be a tradition, as the repeated acts and notions derived from some principle or principles of that which is deemed established protects the principle or principles from intellectual depreciation and falsification. Thus anything which is established is intolerant to any kind of defiance against the established principle or principles.

If we are here to talk of freedom of speech and belief in regard to the pursuit of intellectual honesty, we must be anti-establishment. Let me here first justify to the fullest of extents freedom of speech in view of perfecting the individual’s intellectual honesty – and also as applied to society as a whole. For since all things seem to aim towards the ultimate good, so humans necessarily aim towards the ultimate good. Then, if we take all human behaviour and possessions, and in fact all human life, to be part of the process of acquiring philosophic truth, freedom of speech must be guaranteed in so far that that this right of humankind is found for intellectual honesty, resulting in the pursuit of philosophic truth itself. Any kind of establishment, then, would interfere with the process of human development of its intellect, and so should be considered a crime against humanity – this includes established tradition. Let individual minds be in the pursuit of its own excellence so as to be intellectually honest of philosophic truth itself in the absence of established things – this is the ultimate good which should be achieved.

My previous paragraph, however, deems establishment, let alone established tradition, to be evil to the ultimate good of the human intellect in so far that anything established does not tolerate heresy – as in the social contract theory. However, if there were polities so dialectical as to inform the need for freedom of mind with established laws, I do not see a problem arising. Forget not how my argument above resulted with a resounding triumph of human nature engaged in chance or unrepeated actions or notions by the support of anti-establishment. For if some establishment, which tolerates nothing else than itself or anything derived from the established principle or principle, tolerates what it should not tolerate, it simply re-affirms and protects individual freedom by the form of government.

That is, by affirming the ultimate good to humankind by humans themselves, and in being intolerant to those whom are against the ultimate good of humankind, the established ‘tradition’, or law, thus becomes dogmatic only in the natural light. For since all aim towards developing one’s own intellect in some way or another, then the common will is in fact by every single body. The intolerance of the establishment for human excellence shall be against those whom are intolerant of the establishment which goes against our freedoms and rights (derived from the principle of intellectual honesty). I here say our freedoms and rights are derived from intellectual honesty because it means we may be honest in respect of the development of the intellect, and so in engaging in civil debates we must also necessarily guarantee freedoms and rights.

In conclusion, a social contract which aims for an intellectually honest society is viable since the principle aims towards to ultimate good – which seems to be the natural direction for all things – and so is definitely unconditionally and securely adhered to by all citizens of the state. The principles derived from intellectual honesty of and for society to achieve, so the intolerance is against the ultimate evil. Even if anything which is established may seem to be for intellectual degradation, the very fact that established law, or ‘tradition’, insists on the ultimate human good thus removes of this very problem itself by undoing itself.