We're Dangerously Close to Giving Big Tech Control Of Our Thoughts

Elon Musk has proclaimed himself to be a "free speech absolutist" though reports of the way employees of his companies have been treated when exercising their free speech rights to criticise him might indicate that his commitment to free speech has its limits. But as Musk's bid to takeover Twitter progresses in fits and starts, the potential for anyone to access and control billions of opinions around the world for the right sum should focus all our minds on the need to protect an almost forgotten right--the right to freedom of thought. In 1942 the U.S. Supreme Court wrote "Freedom to think is absolute of its own nature, the most tyrannical government is powerless to control the inward workings of the mind." The assumption that getting inside our heads is a practical impossibility may have prevented lawyers and legislators from dwelling too much on putting in place regulation that protects our inner lives. But it has not stopped powerful people trying to access and control our minds for centuries.