"Rule" "Freedom" "Reason"

The first book in English by Professor Sir Karl Popper was accepted for publication in London while Hitler’s bombs were falling, and was published in 1945 under the title “The Open Society and its Enemies”. The book was well received, but in this article Sir Karl questions whether his central theory of democracy (which he does not characterise as “the rule of the people”) has been understood.

MY THEORY of democracy is very simple and easy for everybody to understand. But its fundamental problem is so different from the age-old theory of democracy which everybody takes for granted that it seems that this difference has not been grasped, just because of the simplicity of the theory. It avoids high-sounding, abstract words like “rule”, “freedom” and “reason”. I do believe in freedom and reason, but I do not think that one can construct a simple, practical and fruitful theory in these terms. They are too abstract, and too prone to be misused; and, of course, nothing whatever can be gained by their definition.

Rule - a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct within a particular activity or sphere.

Freedom -  the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.

Reason -  the power of the mind to think, understand, and form judgments by a process of logic.

Herein lies the problem that Popper was trying to address...   these three words:  rule, freedom, and reason have specific definitions according the the dictionaries that I looked at...  but each of these definitions will be PERCEIVED differently by people for a variety of reasons.  Some of these reasons are:

• Influence of parent or guardian
• Geographic location
• Religious influences
• Adolescent environment
• Educators
• Heritage
• Ethnicity
• Gender

For instance, a generally accepted and valid personality questionaire is the MBTI and according to this indicator, my personality type is an INTJ...  INTJ's are only found in 1% of the general population...  which means not only are we rare, but we have a different perception of life and of words than most everybody else...

In other words, I understand these three words differently than you understand them. 

• Rule means something different to me than it does to you
• Freedom means something different to me than it does to you
• Reason means something different to me than it does to you

THEREFORE...

I see Democracy differently than you do...  which means that Popper was correct in his analysis that these three words UNDERMINE THE SUCCESS OF A DEMOCRACY...   and, what that means is that it is very difficult to implement a Democracy due to all the different perceptions of how our societies should be...

AND WHAT THIS MEANS is...   How do you control the masses?