Walking around a neighborhood in a developing nation, you might notice that many stores have recently gone out of business, and many more shops have recently opened. Some of the new stores might be ordinary things that you’ve seen many times before, and some of them might be unusual items that you’d never thought of purchasing before that day.
If you’re used to living in a developed country, you might believe that stability is the primary indicator of a healthy economy. In some sense, that is an illusion. A real healthy economy will have people experimenting, feeling free to take risks on new ideas - after all, that is how progress is made.
Similarly, in educated societies we are accustomed to having certain ideas be accepted - for example, the concept that the earth is a spheroid, and orbits around the sun. It seems a reasonable idea, and it’s so ingrained within us that when someone presents an alternate view, we might even be offended. We might even think that the idea is dangerous and should be silenced.
As much as we might believe an idea can hurt us, it cannot. Having access to more concepts, and the respectful discussion of them, can only enrich us, just as we are enriched by peaceful and innovative entrepreneurs.
For the transcript: Marketplace of Ideas A Beautiful Thought
