Individual Development In Society

According to Mills, government should not be attempting to control individual freedoms, but should be helping individuals develop in society. A society is only as great as the people who are in it. How a person develops should be up to them, but a government should support that development. Ensuring a free flow of factual information and opportunities for open discussion are ways a government can help. Again, he uses history as his support. He says that the history of mankind is a history of intellectual and social progress. All of the advances of our history are based on man's desire to move away from ignorance. We are the only species that has the capacity to reason and develop our intellect for our own benefits. It is the development of our intellectual capacity that has made us what we are today and distinguishes us as different from animals. Our progress as a species is based upon the acquiring of new knowledge’s and truths. How can any society change and develop if everybody thinks and acts alike? We should be encouraging different ideas and thinking. We need to look at a question or an issue from all sides and each end. We should be creating an environment that encourages the creation of genius.
"Genius can only breathe freely in an atmosphere of freedom. Persons of genius are, ex vi termini, more individual than any other people—less capable, consequently, of fitting themselves, without hurtful compression, into any of the small number of moulds which society provides in order to save its members the trouble of forming their own character."
(On Liberty, Chapter 3)
As Mills sees it, Jesus was a genius who thought and acted outside the accepted box of his time. His actions, cut short by a repressive government certainly c...

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...owing people to practice individual freedoms within reason and without unnecessary government intervention, a society can achieve great things. The advances we have made, the contributions to the world, and the growths we have made as a society (all though we still have a long way to go), all speak to the importance of individual liberties and allowing the environment for the creation and support of genius.
As a member of a society who seems to be a "success" story based upon Mills thoughts, it is also important to heed his warnings about the ever-present threat of power grabbing, and the creation and perpetuation of dogma. On Liberty is a document to be read and re-read by anyone who believes and cherishes individual rights and freedoms. They are not based upon a hypothetical society. The lessons are based on common sense and the experience of John Stuart Mills.