The principle that intellectual pursuits need not serve practical utility to be valuable, and that fairness includes protecting inquiry for its own sake.
Sor Juana's accusers demanded her learning serve practical ends: becoming a better nun, better servant, better woman according to prescribed roles. She resisted, insisting on the right to study mathematics, astronomy, philosophy, and ancient texts simply because truth itself warranted pursuit. The defense of useless knowledge—or more precisely, knowledge pursued for understanding rather than profit or power—is essential to fairness. When societies demand that all intellectual work justify itself through utility, they suppress the deepest human capacities for wonder, criticism, and pure comprehension. They transform knowledge into mere labor. Fairness requires protecting space for inquiry that challenges power structures, explores unprofitable questions, and honors the human drive to understand. This does not mean all knowledge is equal or that no judgment applies, but that the criterion cannot be utility alone. Every civilization claiming justice must permit and honor the person who asks questions simply because they are worth asking.
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