In what is being called a challenge to conventional free speech principles, a study performed by scientists from the Indian Institute of Science has concluded that the nation will be “significantly better off” if 82 percent of its citizens stopped having opinions with immediate effect.

“We tested a large number of people across a wide range of topics and issues. In general, we observed that a majority of people possessed high levels of information recall when it came to things such as timings of reality shows, lyrics to item numbers and names of cricketers. When we tested for knowledge in areas such as economics, science, environment and even history and geography as well as for the ability to reach logically coherent conclusions, we found abysmally low levels of proficiency. Truth be told, we found that most of the opinions expressed by most people to be ill conceived and dangerous to the nation. Based on the study, it’s our firm belief that if 82 percent of the people in the country were to be somehow immediately stopped from having any opinions whatsoever, our GDP growth could be easily boosted by an additional 4 to 5 points,” said Professor Viru Sahasrabuddhi who spoke on behalf of the group in Bangalore yesterday.

Prof. Sahasrabuddhi and his team shot to fame in 2008 for discovering path breaking insights into the human condition such as ‘if asked, most Indians will provide directions to any address in any city, regardless of whether they know the directions or not’ and for conclusively proving the extensive use of the word ‘Yes’ among Indians to mean ‘No’.

Professor Sahasrabuddhi added, “Freedom of opinion and expression is no doubt a cornerstone of democracy. But, I must hasten to add that we analyzed several sources of opinions such as television debates, newspaper editorials, Facebook status updates and Twitter timelines. It is quite evident that there is an abundance of illogical thinking, knee jerk reactions and ignorance wherever we look. While it takes all kinds of people to make up the society, it’s obvious that the opinions of some kinds of people are entirely unnecessary.”