Epistemic Autonomy and Dissent

Sor Juana's famous response to the Bishop of Puebla, the *Respuesta a Sor Filotea*, defends her right to think critically and disagree with Church authority on matters of theology and scripture. She asserts that conscience and reason cannot be compelled or silenced. Epistemic autonomy means that your conclusions—your property in understanding—belong to you, not to the institution claiming authority over belief. For libertarian justice, this is freedom from intellectual coercion and confiscation of thought. It protects the space where dissent, heresy, and heterodox belief can exist without punishment. Property rights include ownership of your conclusions, interpretations, and intellectual positions. Censorship, forced recantation, and ideological enforcement are violations of this property right. True libertarian justice requires that no authority—religious, state, or professional—can legitimately confiscate your right to think otherwise.