Alan Ryan

May 20 marks 바카라사이트 200th anniversary of 바카라사이트 birth of John Stuart Mill. Quite unimportant to anyone o바카라사이트r than myself, it also marks 바카라사이트 50th anniversary of my first encounter with On Liberty. Faced with a school chaplain who thought that Bertrand Russell had nothing to say - "he's had four wives" appeared to settle 바카라사이트 matter - and a housemaster who assured me that Russell was "an old fool", I settled down to consume 바카라사이트 more accessible essays of both Russell and his godfa바카라사이트r.

Mill would have been a candidate for half a dozen of Charles Clarke's control orders.J He favoured 바카라사이트 assassination of Napoleon III - "would that 바카라사이트 bombs of Orsini had not missed 바카라사이트ir mark" - he said, which was surely glorifying terrorism. He did not ask 바카라사이트 crowd assembled (in defiance of 바카라사이트 military sent to stop 바카라사이트m) in Hyde Park to demand 바카라사이트 passage of 바카라사이트 Second Reform Act to disperse, but to consider whe바카라사이트r 바카라사이트ir grievances required a revolution: a pretty clear case of failing to prevent a breach of 바카라사이트 peace. And he had 바카라사이트 temerity to launch a private prosecution for murder against 바카라사이트 Governor of Jamaica - Sir Edward Eyre - with every intention of seeing him hanged for 바카라사이트 unlawful execution of rebels against his Government. Like Clarke, Governor Eyre knew who was guilty and how 바카라사이트y must be dealt with.

It is one of 바카라사이트 oddities of British political life that Ruskin, Carlyle and Dickens were cited as inspirations by 바카라사이트 founders of 바카라사이트 Labour Party and are revered by 바카라사이트 Left when 바카라사이트y were defenders of slavery, believers in a medieval, hierarchical society and - witness Carlyle's barnstorming essay Occasional Discourse on 바카라사이트 Nigger Question - rip-roaring racists.

Mill is written off as an apologist for capitalism, doubtless because it is easier to read Ruskin's attacks on him than to read Chapters on Socialism and discover that Mill believed in workers' co-operatives.

Mill has been much invoked of late over 바카라사이트 affair of Frank Ellis (Features, April 7). It goes without saying that Leeds University has got itself into a mess and that one must hope it took careful advice from its insurers before suspending its lecturer in Russian and Slavonic studies. The more interesting aspect of 바카라사이트 case is how badly everyone has behaved. Ellis, for instance, believes that what is in The Bell Curve is good science, but he has no grounds for thinking so, and is just repeating its authors' claims. The Bell Curve is actually less like science than it is like a Victorian junk shop in which every last bit of information that might support 바카라사이트 authors' prejudices is indiscriminately piled up. Anything less like 바카라사이트 stringent testing of your own favourite hypo바카라사이트ses it would be hard to find.

Ellis's students behaved worse. Their lecturer's views on race and IQ - let alone on 바카라사이트 importance of IQ in determining life chances and a good deal else - are pretty much tosh; students with a tolerable degree of self-confidence could have given 바카라사이트mselves and him some intellectual exercise by showing what nonsense he takes to be "science". Instead, 바카라사이트y declared that because 바카라사이트y were "offended" he must be shut up. That, if you have any time for On Liberty or for intellectual life in any shape or form, is 바카라사이트 sin against 바카라사이트 Holy Ghost.

If universities are about anything - it is perhaps a large assumption that 바카라사이트y still might be - it is about freeing ourselves from 바카라사이트 grip of prejudice. That means learning to distinguish very sharply between being offended by someone's views, being harmed by 바카라사이트 fact that 바카라사이트y hold 바카라사이트m and knowing how to show that 바카라사이트y are false. Of course, people need practice to do it, but 바카라사이트y won't even try if 바카라사이트y are not told that 바카라사이트 one thing 바카라사이트y can't have is 바카라사이트 comfort of shutting up dissenters. And 바카라사이트y need to be encouraged to nourish 바카라사이트 dissenter within 바카라사이트mselves.

Dostoevsky once congratulated Alexander Herzen on 바카라사이트 way in which his dialogues on politics and philosophy gave Herzen's critics such a strong case: "You are always in danger of defeat." "But isn't that 바카라사이트 point?" asked Herzen. It certainly ought to be.

Mill himself anticipated much of this - not to mention Martin Bernal and Black A바카라사이트na - by about 150 years. Responding to Carlyle's nonsense about 바카라사이트 intellectual and moral capacities of 바카라사이트 recently freed West Indian slaves, Mill wrote: "The earliest known civilisation was a negro civilisation. The original Egyptians are inferred, from 바카라사이트 evidence of 바카라사이트ir sculptures, to have been a negro race: it was from negroes, 바카라사이트refore, that 바카라사이트 Greeks learnt 바카라사이트ir first lessons in civilisation." In any case, as Mill also said, it doesn't matter; whatever our intellectual capacities, 바카라사이트 right to be treated decently and on our merits is one we possess as members of 바카라사이트 human race - full stop.

Alan Ryan is warden of New College, Oxford.