In many of our most prestigious educational institutions, you can go literally from kindergarten to the Ph.D., without ever encountering an argument that differs fundamentally from whatever beliefs are being indoctrinated in these institutions. Such indoctrination has long been common in totalitarian dictatorships. But, in recent times, it has also become increasingly widespread in American educational, corporate and other institutions.
On many college campuses, it has become common for invited speakers, with viewpoints different from the viewpoints of the campus indoctrinators, to be prevented from speaking by mob disruptions and threats.
This website provides an alternative way that people can access information and viewpoints that differ from the prevailing indoctrination viewpoints. There are vast sources of factual information, analysis and viewpoints that allow people to decide for themselves what they want to believe.
The purpose of this website is to enable people who want to think for themselves to readily find many sources of information and analysis on many subjects— whether in the form of brief commentaries or hour-long interviews of knowledgeable people in electronic media. Written material is also available, ranging in size from essays to books written for either a general audience or for others seeking scholarly studies in great depth.
There are also whole college courses available on-line— some free— from Hillsdale College. Students can compare how the same subjects are taught in the college they are attending. So can parents who are paying for their education. More important, mobs cannot stop you from learning things they don't want you to hear.
You can readily sample what is available, just by clicking on whatever subjects you might be interested in, from the list on the home page. It is an easy way to escape those who want to indoctrinate— whether on campus, in the media or elsewhere. A free society requires free minds.
The ultimate purpose of this website is not to simply replace particular beliefs on particular subjects with different beliefs on those subjects. What is crucial, for young people especially, is to develop and exercise the ability to confront opposing beliefs and put those beliefs to tests of facts and logic.
Even if all the beliefs currently being indoctrinated were completely correct, that would be of little value to people graduating from college today— with more than half a century of life ahead of them, in which new issues are almost certain to arise. At that point, knowing the correct answers to the issues of the past would be of little use, without having developed and exercised the ability to confront new opposing beliefs and test them against facts and logic.
The history of a people or a society that succumbs to rhetoric and groupthink has often been a history of tragedies and even horrors.
Thomas Sowell, CEO
Facts Against Rhetoric
434 Galvez Mall
Stanford, California 94305
P.S.: For anyone ready to put themselves to the test, a small excerpt about income statistics, from a book of mine, is attached. Other people with opposite views on that subject are quoted— and cited, so that you can look up what they said, in their own words. Whether you end up agreeing with me or with them is beside the point. What matters is whether you can independently confront opposing viewpoints with systematic tests, rather than accept popular rhetoric or widely held assumptions. That is ultimately what this website is about.
Ping.
Thanks - will check it out.
Ping for later.
I am having difficulty finding the website factsagainstrhetorid.org.
Anyone having any luck finding it?
bump for later
Here’s a link to the website. Note that it has a name that is different from the one at the top of the article. It appears to be the proper website.