Free Speech Union Tour Stop in Christchurch, NZ

Spectrum Street Epistemology

At the beginning of December, I was on a Free Speech tour hosted by the Free Speech Union of New Zealand. My team and I traveled to four different cities and tried different flavors of Street Epistemology in front of live audiences. Today's video is from our Christchurch event. Here, we had a conversation and we saw a live demonstration of intellectual courage. Participants didn't just speak—they listened, they challenged, they learned.

New Zealand is a fascinating place. The people—and you can see this reflected in the participants—are civilized (for lack of a more precise word), open, and yet a tad naive. For the most part they assume good intentions on the part of people with whom they’re conversing. One thing you may find interesting is that what is controversial to them is not necessarily controversial to those who live in the US. Mātauranga Māori (also called Māori knowledge), for example, is controversial in whether academic institutions accord it the status of science.

Finally, truth doesn't hide in echo chambers. It is discovered through dialogue. Consequently, free speech isn't just a right: It is our most powerful error-correction mechanism and an indispensable part of a truth-seeking endeavor. When we only talk to people who agree with us, we're not evaluating and analyzing what we believe and why we believe it. We're convincing ourselves of what we already believe. My hope is that my team and I practiced what we “preached” and demonstrated this in New Zealand.

I hope you enjoy this video and the subsequent videos we release from New Zealand. I think you’ll find the participants open minded, difficult to offend, and sincere. This is something we need more of in the US.