This is a fun question, sent in by Rebecca Reboo, and there are a few things we want to do with it. First, we have to consider what brainwashing is. Then we can discuss what thinking for oneself is. Finally, we can answer the original question.
We hear the word ‘brainwash’ in media and the news, but it is not always as complex or clinical as it looks in TV and movies. Nor does it necessarily take the form of the type of mind-control shown in some science fiction. Brainwashing is simply a repetitive technique or set of techniques used to change someone’s perspective or stance on a particular idea. Media campaigns for products do that every day in subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) ways, so to a certain extent we are all already brainwashed. That is not to say that we are all programmed, because we aren’t, but maybe we are guided or persuaded.
The idea of thinking for oneself is lovely, but it is complicated and does not always amount to much in practical application. To truly and fully think for oneself, one must rely only on one’s own mind and reason to discern things in the world. French philosopher René Descartes asserted in his Meditations that if a person can only know the things inside his own mind, then the only thing he can ever be truly certain of is that he exists. Continuing with that line of thinking, pun possibly intended, if that is where we must start every day when we wake up in order to think for ourselves, then we won’t accomplish much! Basically, it amounts to re-inventing the wheel every day, and that’s not how we roll.
Over the courses of our lives, we come to rely on the work of those who came before us to flesh out the concepts we need to go about our daily lives and get along in the world. To live in a society, we must agree on certain standards to which we all adhere and rules which we all obey. We go through a learning process (parents and schooling, usually), and some trial and error of our own, to figure out which concepts are beneficial to us, and those which do not work. All of that relies on research done by others and on people who were already influenced by repetitive techniques and product campaigns in the past. In practical application, this is our starting point for ‘thinking for ourselves’ on a day-to-day basis. The day-to-day information we use is already a product of ‘brainwashing’.
Thought experiment time: suppose that we are kidnapped or taken in by a group and further brainwashed into believing something different from our base, day-to-day state, as we established a moment ago. Suppose further that the group that kidnapped us lets us go after their experiment is over. The de-programming process is yet another set of repetitive techniques used to change our perspective, even if its intent is to erase any harm done by the group’s brainwashing. However, no experience is ever fully erased (as long as we retain our memories), so we are never really the same person as before (we learn from our experiences). That said, the malicious beliefs that the group instilled in us can be removed from a prominent place in our minds and put elsewhere to be accessed as memories from then on, instead of as a primary belief system.
So, Rebecca, the full answer to your question is that already we do not think for ourselves in the sense described. We are never able to truly think without some help from others. If we are ever de-programmed, we are still a changed version of ourselves; never the original.
What do you think? Can we ever really think for ourselves? Let us know in the comments.
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Image: Graffiti by Mr. Brainwash (credit)
I am a post-graduate researcher and teaching assistant in the Philosophy Department at Mary Immaculate College in Ireland. I obtained my undergraduate and master’s degrees, both interdisciplinary in philosophy and religious studies, from Arizona State University in the United States. My doctoral dissertation (and passion) establishes a theodicy embracing Stoic philosophy as an enhancement to one’s understanding of the problem of gratuitous suffering in the world, and centers on philosopher John Hick’s use of St. Irenaeus’ early Christian theodicy. My expertise include hermeneutics and ethics, and my interests extend to ancient religious cults and early monotheism.