As the Internal Vice President of Students For Freethought at OSU, I find myself constantly defining and defending the word “freethought.” Such frequent examination of the term at first made me doubt its effectiveness at labeling our eclectic group of atheists, agnostics, skeptics and other sorts of non-believers. However, the conclusion I keep returning to is that this word is more descriptive of our group than anything else shorter than a paragraph.The historical definition of freethought has meant freedom from dogmatic ways of thinking. Simply put, that which we can all repeatedly verify with our five senses and logic is considered fact, and that which is revealed only through subjective experience or intuition is not necessarily false, but remains a personal belief. True freedom from dogma is not outright rejection of religious ideas, but rather is not putting absolute trust into anything that can not be proven.Are all freethinkers therefore atheists? Certainly not. No more than all atheists are freethinkers. It is possible to be a dogmatic atheist, subscribing faithfully to the bold statement, “There is absolutely no God!” Freethought is a way of thinking, not a set of beliefs.Imagine you have a friend named Joe who has bad eyesight, and Joe gets laser surgery to cure his sight. Is he still the same person? Most of us would say, “Of course!” Then Joe has a heart attack and gets a new heart. Still Joe? What if the heart is made of synthetic materials instead of organic ones? Then a new technology develops and Joe acquires an implant which allows him to compute most mathematic equations instantaneously, like a calculator. Later on he acquires another implant which allows him to read as fast as he can turn a page. Another implant increases the speed at which he thinks, and then enhances memory. Finally, Joe’s body has grown so old that he will not go on much longer, so his brain, with all his memories, is scanned and uploaded to an artificial body. If that body opened its eyes and claimed to be Joe, would you believe it? What made Joe Joe? His memories? His personality type? A culmination of many small things, or some one essential part?Defining personhood is just one of many philosophical questions mankind has sought to answer through religion, art, literature and discussion. But as soon as one question is answered with something mysterious and absolute, no more meaningful questions follow. Satisfied with an answer even more mystical than the original question, we stop thinking about it altogether, and stand no chance to discover we were wrong. Very often, questions are more valuable than answers.It is curiosity and skepticism, not righteousness, that characterizes freethinkers. They think without overconfidence, realizing the limitations of an individual’s senses. Freethinkers exude careful contemplation over philosophical matters because they realize that beliefs affect actions. They attempt to be as objective as possible, simultaneously remembering that no human is completely free of personal bias. And finally, true freethinkers acknowledges the difference between believing something and knowing it.
Martha Knox is a senior fine arts painting and drawing major and an anthropology minor from Medina, Ohio. Her other columns, poetry and artwork can be found at www.geocities.com/SoHo/Study/7432.
