Modern intellectualism is flawed in a fundamental manner - there is too much dependence on ‘facts’ and pre-existing opinions, and too little tolerance for ideas that have not been previously researched.

And the really terrible part is that these ‘facts’ usually are not. If a researcher publishes some soft research in some area - for example, on how memories are stored, you will see people reference this research as if it were fact. It’s usually not - it’s a supposition, it’s a theory backed by statistical data, it’s just a step towards a more complete understanding, but it’s not a fact.

The university system teaches people to have ideas that are based off the published results of other people - but some ideas cannot reference pre-existing work because the work is obscure or no research has been done in that area. One would have to make an argument that has suppositions in it for which there are no references. Obviously, such an argument may be wrong, but this does not make it pointless - rather, if the argument is compelling logically, then parts of it may be correct. There is great value in reading through different theories that are not all based on the same facts - because seeing a bunch of different ideas from different people is exactly what may bring the flash of intuition that takes us all forward.

Let me get more concrete and give an example: Let’s say we are holding an argument about the fundamental structure of matter - our educational system encourages people to back up their arguments by referencing pre-existing opinions and simply quoting a bunch of people researching string theory. If a layman attempted to bring in a new idea to explain the structure, he would be asked to back it up. It cannot be backed up obviously, because he is not a researcher - but the thing is that he may be right. If the professionals would consider his argument on its merits, and simply as a philosophical excercise, they may be able to reach a better result when they combine it with their actual knowledge.

A disadvantage of too large a specialisation in a field is that one tends to lose perspective. One tends to dismiss ideas that threaten the core path you are following. It is good for people to be following different paths, and the problem with always needing to reference pre-existing works is that people will always tends to follow the orthodoxy, leading to less creativity and fewer new ideas.

I am of the opinion that people should be encouraged to follow different theories and try different methods. Most will fail, but a small number will produce new thoughts and ideas. And that’s what has brought us this far as humans - it’s not our research or analysis, it’s our ideas.