If censorship were performed by maximally knowledgeable and reliable censors (philosopher-kings) who censor all and only false beliefs, the truth-tracking argument would provide no objection to such censorship.
Ideas or convictions that don't match reality—things you think are true but actually aren't.
knowledge(Distinguished from mere true belief, which may be the product of indoctrination and need not exercise deliberative capacities.)
Justified true belief — true belief that has been arrived at through the exercise of deliberative capacities, including comparison of and deliberation among alternatives.
objection(as a scientific critique)
A logical problem or reason why something might not work or be true. Einstein found what he thought was a flaw in Weyl's theory.
philosopher-kings(Adapted from Plato's Republic; used here as a thought experiment to test the limits of the truth-tracking argument)
Hypothetical maximally knowledgeable and reliable censors who censor all and only false beliefs, leaving all true beliefs uncensored.
Another way to see the weakness of the truth-tracking justification of freedom of expression is to notice that this instrumental defense of freedom of expression cannot explain what is wrong with censorship that is successful in truth-tracking terms. Suppose we lived in a society of the sort Plato imagines in the Republic in which cognitive capacities are distributed unequally between rulers and citizens and in which maximally knowledgeable and reliable censors—call them “philosopher kings”—cens