> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. I can easily imagine situations where that's not true; besides that, you'd have to admit that people being

> The solution to bad ideas is more ideas, not less. I can easily imagine situations where that's not true; besides that, you'd have to admit that people being convinced of bad (and potentially deadly ideas, e.g. anti-vaccination) will happen for some period of time. This concept of "more ideas" is time-based, it relies on the hypothesis that things work out to "the truth" in the end. I don't think that's the case much of the time, and I can see why people don't like the idea of holding that hope for some statements. There is reason to believe that some authorities - such as scientific ones and even judicial ones, do a better job of finding truth than other venues of discussion. I think AskHistorians desires to be a microcosm of that. There is an excellent paper by Fred Schauer about the "search for truth" defence of free speech, and how it relates to time[0]. [0] "Free Speech, the Search for Truth, and the Problem of Collective Knowledge" (2017): https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&context=smulr https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4682&con...