Summary
Having already examined whether people should be allowed to hold and express
unpopular beliefs, Mill looks at the question of whether people should be
allowed to act on their opinions without facing legal punishment or
social stigma. Mill observes that actions should not be as free as opinions,
and reasserts that both must be limited when they would cause harm to others and
be "a nuisance to other people." However, many of the reasons for respecting
different opinions also apply to respecting actions. Since humans are
fallible, different "experiments of living" are valuable. The expression of
individuality is essential for individual and social progress.
Individuality is essential to the cultivation of the self. A basic problem that
Mill sees with society is that individual spontaneity is not respected as having
any good in itself, and is not seen as essential to well-being. Rather, the
majority thinks that its ways should be good enough for everybody. Mill argues
that while people should be trained as children in the accumulated knowledge of
human experience, they should also have the freedom as adults to interpret that
experience as they see fit. He places great moral emphasis on the process of
making choices, and not simply accepting customs without questions: only people
who make choices are using all of their human faculties. Mill then links the
desires and impulses reflected in individuality with the development of
character: "One whose desires and impulses are not his own, has no character, no
more than a steam engine has character."
Mill writes that in early stages of society, it is possible that there could be
too much individuality. However, the danger now is rather the stifling of
desires and impulses. He says that people become more valuable to themselves
and also more able to be valuable to others when they develop their
individuality. Mill then turns to the second part of his discussion, the ways
in which people who exercise their liberty as individuals are valuable to
others.
Individuality is valuable because people might learn something from the
nonconformists. Dissenters may discover new goods, and keep alive existing
goods. While genius is rare, it is also true that "Genius can only breathe free
in an atmosphere of freedom." Unoriginal people tend to not see the
value of originality, and tend to shun genius for mediocrity. Mill argues
against this tendency, saying that all people should value what originality
brings to the world. Furthermore, Mill argues that the modern age (the 19th
century), in contrast to the Middle Ages, tends to diminish the individual and
encourage mediocrity, linking this tendency with the democratization of culture
and government. A conscious effort needs to be made to counteract this trend.
There is no one pattern for how to best live life. If a person is sufficiently
developed, then his choices for how to live life are best precisely because they
are his own. People require different atmospheres in order to develop and reach
their potentials, and a healthy society must make it possible for people to
follow more than one pattern.
Liberty and individuality are essential to individual and social progress.
Seeing people's dissimilarities is key in learning about one's own weaknesses.
Diversity also lets us see the potential of combining the positive traits of
different people. Forced conformity, in contrast, keeps people from learning
from each other. Mill writes that it is "despotism of custom" that prevents the
improvement of England, and that it is Europe's relative diversity of lifestyles
and paths that makes it more progressive than conformist China. However, Mill
worries that Europe is progressing towards the Chinese ideal of "making all
people alike," and will thus face stagnation.
