Sheesh. This should not surprise any reader of past Sid comments: It depends on how one defines being a sheeple (sheeperson?). I don't define it by what one believes but how one forms her or his beliefs. Sheeple will form beliefs based on authority more often. When defending their beliefs, the phrase “XXX says” will be featured prominently. Common examples include “I believe in creationism because the Bible says…” or “Of course the government is to blame for our current economic woes, Ayn Rand says…”

I'm not sure what, exactly, the dividing line is. It's probably a spectrum from, say Socrates on the free-thinking side to Fred Phelps (of Westboro Baptist Church infamy) on the authority side. Based on how I defined it, I would say I'm much closer to the free-thinking end of the spectrum.

Sid's right in that it's not a matter of the beliefs held so much as why one believes them. I would strengthen that by saying that free-thinking and group-think, if they could be clearly defined at all, are ways of being (that is, being a person) with no necessary connection to any particular beliefs. Being one of the sheeple is a way of living one's life, as is being a free-thinker.

For that reason, I think that one can, in fact, be a free-thinker without rejecting any beliefs held due to authority. One can accept that these guys who talk about the moon and gravity are probably right; after all, they spend all their lives working on this stuff. Or one can accept that a given book (The Bible, Atlas Shrugged, The Lord of the Rings, etc.) seems to be a worthy source of authority about things. But for the free-thinker, if something comes up that shows these authorities to be wrong where they had appeared to be right, well, then they're wrong. One's not bucking to authority because one chooses the authority in a freely held sense, by one's own standard. And if one's standard is also that of a majority of other people's, so what? If one is accepting it because it is the standard that makes the most sense to him or her, rather than just because it's what others say is right, then I see no issue. Free-thinking can follow any sort of authority, so long as the court of final appeal remains within oneself. In fact, rejecting beliefs because of the fact that they are imposed or given the mantle of authority would be to be one of the sheeple, just one in rebel's clothing (since even the counter-culture depends for its identity upon the culture it is rejecting, and is thus defined by and dependent for its meaning and significance upon it). (We must, of course, also remember the psychological fact that, like it or not, we grow up with beliefs and biases of some sort to begin with, and which form a part of our decision-making processes. Yet such a thing makes up our own identities; it makes the processes themselves no less ours.)

To solve the problem, to change from sheeple to free-thinker, a person would have to change the way he or she lives, rather than worrying about particular beliefs. That's hard to do. It's particularly hard in this case, because the problem is a dependence upon authority, and any change that comes solely from the new guide's authority rather than a change in the person would not only completely miss the problem, it would make it worse by making the person think that he or she was 'free,' when the truth was that he or she was still standing at square one.

I've put some thought ont this topic into the upcoming tome. The idea that Christians are sheep and the rest of humanity goats. You can spin that to say that Christians are followers/drones, whereas nonbelievers are more determined (or headstrong) and will consume anything they find edible (that can be spun as positive or a negative too).

In general, we think of (the actual animals called) sheep as simple, stupid, slow and in some circles… rural rape victims (okay, joking on the last one). Who would want to identify with that, except people with perpetual victim-syndrome or those who have convinced themselves of their own indecisive nature?

In other words, why would intelligent believers find this analogy comforting and not at least a little condescending?

For many atheists, they find as much definition for themselves in not believing something as a believer does in his own truths. So in a sense, yes, many athiests are following a lead as well. Contrarian-style… they do what the other crowd does not. But still just as sheepishly slavish to some direction.

I think that determining one's self to be open, that is to being not committed to specific ruleset–this is the only way to avoid being led. If your only truth is that you cannot find truth by listening to others beliefs, then I think yes, you are as truly a follower of nothing as you can be.

Following what makes sense to you as an individual is not being led. If you do not see your desires, your ego, your perspectives to be a separate thing within your conscious mind, then what is left? You are a goat. Or more accurately, not a barnyard metpahor at all.

So if you're a free thinker who never changes his mind about an authority are you still a free thinker?

So what if being led is what makes sense to me as an individual? Is not being led by people you see as wiser a sort of foolishness?

@Sidfaiwu – Yeah I think that thinking of it as a spectrum is pretty accurate. I do think that appealing to authority is a large part of it, but then think about the cartoon. It’s making the point that one think that many people think that they are free thinkers. The Randians may not appeal to authority consciously (maybe theydo, I don’t know) and I know many people whom I’ve met over the years who wouldn’t consider themselves as sheeple or as appealing to authority overmuch (subjective that). My question is how do we check ourselves and make sure that we aren’t blindly following. Is merely thinking about it enough to break the cycle?

@Sidfaiwu – Yeah I think that thinking of it as a spectrum is pretty accurate. I do think that appealing to authority is a large part of it, but then think about the cartoon. It’s making the point that one think that many people think that they are free thinkers. The Randians may not appeal to authority consciously (maybe theydo, I don’t know) and I know many people whom I’ve met over the years who wouldn’t consider themselves as sheeple or as appealing to authority overmuch (subjective that). My question is how do we check ourselves and make sure that we aren’t blindly following. Is merely thinking about it enough to break the cycle?

[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ’0 which is not a hashcash value.

Yeah, having good working definitions of 'sheeple' and 'free-thinker' doesn't guarantee good self-identification. How do we check ourselves? Well any honest self-evaluation is difficult at best. I'm no expert at that at all.

There are things I do to limit the chances that I'll move towards the sheeple end of the spectrum based on my definition. Come up with my own thoughts (like spit-balling a working 'sheeple' definition), check with multiple authorities, prefer experts to laity, and be willing to change my beliefs as contradictory evidence is presented.

Of course many of those things are time-intensive and are thus not always possible but I do what I can.

[...] Now I now some of the Christians in the audience might be thinking that there is a pitfall here.  Might not having an atheist or a scientologist or a democrat or whatever friend “drag me down” somehow?  I suppose that’s possible.  I’m not advocating that one dumps one’s friends who are of a like mind.  That would be silly.  But, if the only “defense” you have against the “others” is hiding in the herd (whatever herd that is) don’t you belong here? [...]

We all depend upon an authority even if we have convinced ourselves that we are that authority. It seems to be an exercise in hubris to claim oneself as the authority unless one is THE leading light in one's field and even then, most of what we know has been passed on to us by some other authority. As Bernard of Chartres wrote and was quoted by Isaac Newton talking about his dependence upon DesCartes, “the dwarf standing on the shoulders of giants sees farther.”

None of us are free thinkers. We all have filters that compromise our ability to know anything absolutely and those filters are the totality of our experiences which include all of our families and teachers and incidental contact with the school janitor. “Even” the school janitor is an authority from whom we can learn if we are not too wrapped up in ourselves.

We all depend upon an authority even if we have convinced ourselves that we are that authority. It seems to be an exercise in hubris to claim oneself as the authority unless one is THE leading light in one's field and even then, most of what we know has been passed on to us by some other authority. As Bernard of Chartres wrote and was quoted by Isaac Newton talking about his dependence upon DesCartes, “the dwarf standing on the shoulders of giants sees farther.”

None of us are free thinkers. We all have filters that compromise our ability to know anything absolutely and those filters are the totality of our experiences which include all of our families and teachers and incidental contact with the school janitor. “Even” the school janitor is an authority from whom we can learn if we are not too wrapped up in ourselves.