On Adler's The Great Ideas: Opinion, Part One

The second chapter of Adler's How to Think About the Great Ideas, entitled How to Think about Opinion, discusses types of opinions, touches on the difference between knowledge and opinion, and explains what it means to have a "right to our own opinion." Adler also introduces several ideas that should be questioned about opinion.

Adler begins by saying that opinion has two significances: theoretical and practical. Opinion's theoretical significance, as Adler explains, is the difference between knowledge and opinion. He explains that knowledge has the aspect of certainty, while opinion deals with the aspect of probability. When people discuss opinions, and try to decide who's opinion is best, they must first assess the probability factor. Knowledge, however, deals with fact, and therefore one cannot say that they have the "best," or "most correct" knowledge. Adler takes note of the fact that the skeptic, discussed in the previous chapter, uses opinion. Thinking back, the skeptic described everything as being a matter of opinion, as any real truth or knowledge is impossible to achieve. Adler also mentions that the skeptic goes to the extreme by saying that no opinion is better than another, but they all hold the same significance. Adler also explains that opinion is "connected with the great theoretical problem of the agreement and disagreement among human beings (12)." I agree with Adler; it is clear, especially in this age, that man is driven by his belief that we all have the right to an opinion. Ironically, man is agreeing to disagree; no one holding the opinion that we have no right to hold an opinion. Opinion is driven mainly by emotions rather than evidence, and therefore disagreements arise. While the skeptic, of course, "believes" that every opinion is valid, despite discrepancies, I believe that because there is always truth, then it is possible to have an opinion that is correct, and an opinion that is incorrect. Adler makes this same point, calling a correct opinion a "right opinion" later, in chapter three. He discusses the difference between a "right opinion" and knowledge; that knowledge has the factor of being understood why something is true, while opinion, based off of emotions, is only a sort of "lucky guess."

Moving on to the practical significance of opinion and how opinions take a part in human relations, Adler touches on the issue of majority rule. He explains that majority rule is one of the basic principles of democracy, and that taking the opinion of the majority as right is "what is right" about having a democracy as a government. I agree that democracy works, and is by far the best government at pleasing the people. However, disagreements always arise in a nation, and democracy is not the solution to the problem of "making everyone happy." It seems that democracy is as close to the extreme right as government as achieved; the right, making everyone happy, and the left, making no one happy. Democracy makes the majority of the common people happy, while governments such as socialism make only a select few in power happy. However, I believe that both democracy, socialism, and all other governments are founded to attempt to make everyone happy, but it is as though they view how to achieve this from two different sides of the page. Democracy's principle of majority rule gives most people exactly what they want, while socialistic government gives everyone (other than the ruling powers) what they sort of need. Democracy is the right government for a nation because although it does not please everyone, it pleases mostly everyone, and therefore "mostly everyone" still wants to keep it in place, because "mostly everyone" receives what they desire or require.

Continuing on the practical significance of opinion, Adler explains that opinion is not only key in a democratic government, but also in business and industry. I agree with Adler; businesses and industries thrive only when they produce what service or product that is of the highest demand in the common people. "Supply and demand" is not just a catch-phrase, but is the heartbeat of a successful business or industry. Businesses and industries, as well as the government, use simple means to gather the information from the people of what they want. Businesses and industries employ people to ask around with polls to find out how they can change themselves to please the people and gain consumers. The government also uses polls, better known as voting ballots, to gather which people who hold specific opinions about how the nation should be run should be in power. This brings us back to the subject of opinions, and makes the point that "if most people ain't happy, ain't nobody happy," which is basically why majority rule (and subsequently democracy and how businesses and industries are run) works.

Adler moves from the two significances of opinion to explain more in depth the characteristics of opinion as opposed to knowledge. He begins by showing the contrast between how truth relates to opinion, and how it relates to knowledge. I will automatically agree with Adler, as I already touched on what point he makes: that knowledge is understood truth, based on observations, while "right opinions" are guessed truths, based on emotions. One of the main factors that show the difference between knowledge and "right opinion" is that the person who holds a "right opinion" about something has no certainty that they hold the truth, while a person with knowledge of something knows that they hold the truth. Now, Adler makes an interesting observation when he asks whether it is possible for one person to have knowledge of one thing, while another person only has "right opinion" about something. I could not decide this, until Adler explained how the teaching systems in most schools incorporate indoctrinating children with "right opinions" rather than knowledge, and that although the children are not "learning," it is still possible for the teacher to have knowledge on what they are giving "right opinions" on. I will continue on this matter when I discuss my views on Adler's third chapter.

As Adler turns back to the ideology of the skeptic, he begins to explain the "fact" that we are all entitled to our own opinions regarding all things. He describes this right as one of our basic civil rights, and explains that it falls into place alongside "freedom of thought and liberty of conscience (16)." I agree with his statement "this right is a right that I think perhaps is more contested in the contemporary world than any other right we have;" I explained how I find that the contestation of this right directly opposes and blocks out my attempts to share my religious beliefs, in my second paragraph of this discussion on Adler's How to Think About the Great Ideas.