Beyond the food, clothing, and shelter necessary to sustain human life — nothing is more important than ideas. Nothing. Not wealth, not power, not justice, not art, not even love: because none of these things can happen without ideas. They are the foundation of everything we think, everything we believe, everything we do — even the important things we feel. Could you really be in love with someone who doesn’t share your key values — the ideas about what’s most important in life?

Without first understanding what we believe and why, our sense of ourselves as self-determining individuals with genuine personal freedom is an illusion. We can’t be autonomous human beings exercising real choices unless we first examine and choose to believe the ideas we have absorbed from our society, teachers, family, and friends. Even our emotional lives arise from the ideas we’ve learned from the people and culture that surround us.

Our ability to create, analyze, and act on ideas is what sets us apart from all other life forms — indeed, from everything else in the known universe. We created the civilization we know through the power of ideas, so we can change the world and our lives by thinking about them differently. And we must, because the fate of the planet depends on understanding, embracing, and nurturing the incomparable power of ideas.

So I ask that you consider the possibility that you don’t really know what you think. If we accept ideas unknowingly, without intentionally endorsing them, then we give up the chance to exercise our freedom and direct our own destiny.

But making that conscious choice requires us to challenge the ideas we take for granted. And before we can do that, we need to recognize the very existence and influence of ideas that may never have caught our attention. We must search carefully, dig up hidden assumptions, and be prepared to challenge what seem like basic, unalterable truths.

You have had countless ideas in your head since you were born, and the ones that define your essence did not occur naturally. Every idea that has ever been in your head either came from another person or was created by you. Only people make up ideas. And the most important ones in your head were probably not created by you. They are the ideas you absorbed from other people, who themselves may have been passing down ideas that others thought up long long ago. Indeed, your most important ideas are probably the ones you never think to question. They are just there, as part of who you are. You use them automatically, like the muscles of your hand when grasping a tool, without conscious effort. Some of your ideas are so deeply woven into your being that you don’t even know you have them.

Western civilization teaches us that the human being is a rational animal, but what matters more is that we are an assuming animal. Our ability to draw logical conclusions is trivial compared with the way we make extraordinary assumptions and then rely on them, often without knowing that we’re doing so. Most Americans believe, for example, in the value of hard work, separation of church and state, good table manners, free enterprise, marrying for love, universal education for children, bans on public nudity, freedom of the press, and an individual’s right of self-determination. Speaking historically, some of these ideas are very new and may have once been viewed as preposterous — or unthinkable.

If you believe in them, why? Probably not because you came up with any of these ideas yourself, but because you absorbed them from our culture — the ultimate human invention. Culture: an astounding set of shared ideas, developed over centuries — indeed, millennia — and passed on with modest change from generation to generation. Our culture defines what we consider “normal,” and this sense of normalcy determines much of our emotional life — even raw feelings that seem to come deep from the gut, independent of rational thinking. Like almost everything else we experience, these emotional responses depend on the ideas that we assume. Would you be outraged by laws permitting slavery, children laboring in dangerous coal mines, or gladiator fights? At one time these practices were considered normal. Are you outraged now by interracial marriage, premarital sex, or the right of women to practice law? Not very long ago, these things outraged many Americans.

Even when we fall in love, our idealization of the perfect mate is drenched with assumptions: he must be tall, handsome, fun, and financially stable; she must be sexy and witty, nurturing and supportive. Although these emotional wishes may seem like natural desires, they have varied tremendously over time and across cultures, and reflect commonly assumed ideas in today’s American society.

Imperceptibly, daily, ubiquitously, the ideas from our culture seeped into your growing soul from the moment you were born. You learned what you believe to be the truth — at this time, in this place, you call home. If Osama Bin Laden had been your father, you would have absorbed a different set of ideas about truth. You would be outraged by America, not radical Islamic terrorists, and you would feel that outrage with the same intensity and sincerity that fills you now when you think of the horrors of 9/11.

That is why we are so obsessed with what we teach our children. They are impressionable. They believe what we tell them; they absorb ideas which then become second nature; they use these ideas as starting points for further assimilation of what seems like truth. We brainwash them, successfully, with our best intentions, information, and love. And something happens along the way as children become adults: their impressionability wanes. They start to think for themselves. They can reject messages from our culture, or anywhere else, when they disagree with them.

But the awful curse of adulthood is that our perception of independent thinking is usually a one-way ratchet. Going forward, we can think for ourselves (based on the ideas we’ve already accepted), much of the time. But we’re terrible at looking back. We don’t see or feel our prior impressionability. We don’t think of ourselves as having been brainwashed. We think we were taught the right stuff, and that we tacitly exercised good judgment when we absorbed our lessons. If we now challenge what we were once taught, it feels disrespectful and wrong — and it’s really hard to do. Many of us do not question, for example, the values our parents taught us, the wisdom of the rights we take for granted, or our core political or religious beliefs. That’s because we usually are not aware of our own assumptions, where they came from, or how they color our perception of everything else that comes our way.

By the time we’re adults, we usually operate under the flawed assumption that we have chosen to believe our own ideas. We think we know what we think. We may even think we know why we think what we think. And we think all this with great passion — because, as adults, we resent being told what to think.

But the truth is that many of our most important beliefs were fed to us when we were children, or perhaps by authority figures whom we trusted as adults. Other people gave us the ideas we now believe and assume, and those people either made up these ideas themselves or passed on the ones that were previously fed to them.

So where did our ideas really come from? Sometimes from great individuals, like Thomas Jefferson or Darwin; and sometimes from collective genius, like the Framers of the United States Constitution. Sometimes ideas are imposed upon us by people with power. For example, Louis XIV of France did his best to spread belief in the divine right of kings, and some madrasas in the Islamic world teach children to hate America.

Sometimes the ideas of powerful people gain acceptance gradually, with no one person or identifiable group of people as the source. Few corporations existed when America was new, but over time they have acquired rights akin to those belonging to individuals. As corporations have become more and more powerful, the top executives who run them have generally worked hard to expand corporations’ power, their rights, and their acceptance in American culture. But they exist only by the grace of state laws. Could you imagine a world without corporations?

We don’t believe in the divine right of kings any more, just as we no longer believe that the world is flat, that the earth is the center of the universe, or that some human races are superior to others. We’ve had what are called “paradigm shifts” on these topics. When Whites believed that Blacks were inferior beings, racial segregation seemed like a simple, “natural” consequence of the “real” differences between the races — at least for most of white America. But as we came to believe in the unconditional equality of the races, segregation was finally perceived as a great injustice.

Truth is not fixed or absolute. Truth, to us fallible humans, is an idea. Although we think something is true if it is an objectively correct fact that does not vary under different circumstances, the content of what we believe to be true changes over time. When people before Copernicus saw the sun move across the sky each day, the truth for our ancestors was that the sun was moving. The assumption that Earth was the center of the universe determined what people knew to be the truth as our planet turned.

Why does all this matter? Why would I talk about this if I had only one chance to reach everybody in the world? Because if we trace the current world’s problems down to their atomic building blocks — past the surface appearances and lumpy molecules, dissecting all the way down to the most basic sub-atomic particles — we find ourselves staring at a culture — indeed, at a world — with a profound failure to understand the origin and power of ideas. And because we no longer live as hunters and gatherers in small tribes, the modern roles of culture, science, economics, politics, religion, government, and interpersonal expectations — and the ideas underlying them — have become all important.

Consider three examples. First, look at the way ideas determine how we value tangible objects. Men pay thousands of dollars for small diamond rings of little intrinsic worth because a carefully orchestrated advertising campaign a hundred years ago exquisitely convinced the American public that an expensive diamond engagement ring is a measure of love. Teenagers have committed murder over sunglasses labeled with a particular designer’s brand. The way we think about objects is often far more important than what they really are. If we could separate the ideas we have about things from the things in and of themselves, much of what we hold dear would look very different.

Second, taking ideas seriously in our personal lives empowers us to be truly self-determining, to exercise our personal freedom wisely, and to lead more purposeful, fulfilling lives. For example, if you are not yet a parent, do you want to have children? Do you know why? Who gave you that idea? Do you agree with it? Why? The ability to answer questions like these is critical before embarking on the lifetime commitment of parenthood.

Third, consider the way “compromise” has become a dirty word on Capitol Hill. That’s because our political culture values party loyalty and litmus tests more than good ideas. We already have very sensible and pragmatic ideas that would enable the government to address the rising costs of entitlement programs and the national debt. But until we are willing to examine these ideas on their own merits, rather than on whether they violate some inflexible dogma against new taxes or cuts in Social Security, we will continue marching towards national bankruptcy. The first step is to legitimize the fundamental principle that what matters is the centrality of good ideas, not the baggage that prevents us from taking them seriously and acting on them.

Can we change the world by thinking about it differently? Absolutely. We’ve done it before. Humans invented democracy and ended slavery, harnessed electricity and nuclear power, created music and art, eradicated smallpox, and enhanced human equality. Today, the world’s biggest problems stem mostly from our failure to act on good ideas, not from a lack of resources or a dearth of information. Whether we’re looking at international tensions arising from cross-cultural distrust, political gridlock from hardened ideology, or collective failures to end prejudice or protect the environment, the place to begin is to uncover the underlying assumptions — the ideas — that lead to conflict or inertia. By failing to dig down to those assumptions, we make huge mistakes, blaming nature instead of ourselves, or blaming limited resources instead of a failure of imagination.

Unfortunately, contemporary American culture tends to devalue the importance of critical thinking and complex ideas. If the Framers of the Constitution were reassembled today, they would likely be derided as a bunch of elitist eggheads who are overly abstract and idealistic, and too quick to compromise; their genius would be wasted. Our best hope for the future is to create a culture that embraces the power of ideas and encourages each of us to recapture a piece of our childhood: to muster the vulnerability necessary to accept new ideas and let them change who we are.

There is no magic bullet for nurturing good ideas and absorbing them into our consciousness as second nature. I honor all those who try. Teachers show us how to learn. Musicians speak to our common humanity with the universal language of song. Philosophers bring depth to our thinking and lay bare false reasoning. Scientists give us raw materials for new theories and a method to test their truth. Novelists bring us inside the hearts and minds of others whom we would never know how to befriend. Management consultants help us adapt to change. Engineers create tools that enhance the capacity of the human mind. Coaches inspire us to push to our limits. Architects bring us spaces where we can share, relax, and create. Psychologists help us understand why we don’t always do what we should. Painters show us how to look at old things anew. Lovers make us feel at home in the world so that we can strive to nurture its better nature.

The human mind is the most extraordinary force in the universe. Galaxies are larger, stars have more energy, lions are stronger, and beetles are more numerous. But our minds are unique in perceiving any universe at all, and in constructing a culture and set of tools that begin to comprehend how that universe works.

The ideas in our minds are the building blocks of this unique force. Let’s examine them, challenge them, test them, change them, and share them. May the best ones be embraced with all our might, so that we may act together, wisely.

— David Kolker

This essay is adapted from the forthcoming book “Challenging Ideas.”