"Western society has many flaws, and it is good for an educated person to have thought some of these through, even at the expense of losing a lecture or two to tear gas"
About this Quote
Robert B. Laughlin folds a scientist's skepticism into a civic lesson: book learning is not enough if it never collides with the world. A mature education asks for more than mastering equations or texts; it demands grappling with real defects in the surrounding culture, the ones that produce injustice, environmental damage, or corrosive inequality. The phrase about losing a lecture or two to tear gas is both wry and pointed. It treats the interruption of classroom routine by protest not as catastrophe but as an acceptable cost of learning how power actually operates and how citizens can respond.
Tear gas is not just a metaphor for discomfort; it is a reminder of the state's coercive edge and the limits of polite debate when grievances are urgent. Exposure to that reality can sharpen judgment in ways no seminar can. Laughlin is not celebrating violence or perpetual disruption. The modesty of "a lecture or two" suggests a sense of proportion, an acknowledgment that institutions still matter. Yet he insists that an educated person should have thought through at least some of society's failings, and that occasionally this thinking must be done in the street as well as the classroom.
The line also reflects the paradox of Western societies: they house traditions of free inquiry and dissent, and they also produce structures that need dissent to correct them. Universities are often where those tensions surface. To be educated in such a place is to be initiated into the practice of critical scrutiny, whether of experimental results or social arrangements. That practice entails risk, discomfort, and the humility to let experience revise theory.
Laughlin's observation carries a quiet rebuke to complacency. Intelligence that never leaves the lecture hall can remain naive. A truly educated mind does not just know that flaws exist; it tests convictions against reality, accepts temporary disorder as the price of clarity, and learns to distinguish performative outrage from principled action.
Tear gas is not just a metaphor for discomfort; it is a reminder of the state's coercive edge and the limits of polite debate when grievances are urgent. Exposure to that reality can sharpen judgment in ways no seminar can. Laughlin is not celebrating violence or perpetual disruption. The modesty of "a lecture or two" suggests a sense of proportion, an acknowledgment that institutions still matter. Yet he insists that an educated person should have thought through at least some of society's failings, and that occasionally this thinking must be done in the street as well as the classroom.
The line also reflects the paradox of Western societies: they house traditions of free inquiry and dissent, and they also produce structures that need dissent to correct them. Universities are often where those tensions surface. To be educated in such a place is to be initiated into the practice of critical scrutiny, whether of experimental results or social arrangements. That practice entails risk, discomfort, and the humility to let experience revise theory.
Laughlin's observation carries a quiet rebuke to complacency. Intelligence that never leaves the lecture hall can remain naive. A truly educated mind does not just know that flaws exist; it tests convictions against reality, accepts temporary disorder as the price of clarity, and learns to distinguish performative outrage from principled action.
Quote Details
| Topic | Freedom |
|---|
More Quotes by Robert
Add to List
