Breadless Norseman
Martin NuttyWriting almost 30 years ago #CarlSagan worried about a country poorly educated in #science
Has has foreboding been realized?
oldfartjmb says FREE PALESTINE@mnutty I'm afraid it has. But, perhaps one might restate it as poorly educated, and leave it at that
sparseMatrix ✅✅✅ 📻short answer: Yes
LOL. Sadly I think you’re correct. The bigger question is whether we can recover?
Badger AF (he/him) DEMOCRACY"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."
—Isaac Asimov
Sherra@Badger_AF @mnutty I found this to be true even while teaching at a large state university on the West Coast, with a good reputation - over 20 years ago.
Mr. Completely@Badger_AF @mnutty Richard Hofstadter won a Pulitzer in 1964 writing about this topic. Currently backordered on bookshop.org but you can order it used from Powells. One of his foundational works
https://www.powells.com/book/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life-2221151767578
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism_in_American_Life
Laure@mrcompletely @Badger_AF @mnutty really this era is marked by the seizure of social channels, the proliferation of websites, tv and radio shows often fronted by powerful interests and their lackeys in what has been a full throttled far right media revolution since 2015. That’s what’s happening.
@mrcompletely @mnutty I purchased it Hofstadter's book a few years back and started reading it, but found it impenetrable. 😞
@Badger_AF @mnutty he certainly wrote in High Midcentury Academic
@mrcompletely @mnutty Thanks goodness - I thought I was a dunce!
@Badger_AF @mnutty really this era is marked by the seizure of social channels, the proliferation of websites, tv and radio shows often fronted by powerful interests and their lackeys in what has been a full throttled far right media revolution since 2015. That’s what’s happening.
If we’re talking of #SocialMedia channels, they were always owned by corporations. #Twitter and #Facebook were created to make money. Serving the public good was a tangential public relations exercise
I totally agree that we have seen extraordinary roll ups of other media properties by large corps, however that has made a space for the not for profits, many of whom carry a more benign message. So I watch #PBS, listen to #NPR and post on #Mastodon for that very reason
@mnutty @Badger_AF what I’m saying is that what we’re experiencing, this far right media revolution is due to mass propaganda and mass agitprop click bait spread across a proliferation of channels and on your mom’s and children’s social platforms in a very opaque and inauthentic way. that’s why we are having issues re covid conspiracy, electoral conspiracy, #qanon etc. Not just anti intellectualism.
@LaureM @mnutty We've always had conspiracy theories and urban legends, but the advent of social media has allowed them to spread exponentially.
I'm always fascinated as to why people believe these things. Some of it is due to some sort of unified theory of everything that's wrong with the world; others want to feel smarter than everyone else - like they're in on something.
@Badger_AF @mnutty agree but they are not passively spreading, they are actively pushed by small groups of every conceivable click bait scammer and political operatives interlaced in huge networks pumping this junk for profit or distracting and muddying up information spaces to eff with policies.
🥥 Tucker Carlson's Nuts 🥥@mnutty reading The Demon Haunted World for the first time a little over a year ago was so incredibly eye opening and painful. He knew what was coming and we failed to stop it.
It feels to me that we have failed to position the scientific mindset as a central element of what it means to be part of Western civilization. As a country we have failed to instill pride in our scientific heritage. I’m not sure what needs to be done to turn this shortcoming around but it seems essential in a time infatuated by implausible conspiracy theories
Darwin Woodkapish, they're not poorly educated, they're willfully ignorant. They had the same learning opportunities we all had for the most part.
Havyhh2@mnutty ....we have breached that foreboding with reality.....
John Shirley@mnutty hell yes it's been realized
LOL. The book is an interesting journey through the crazy stuff people opt to believe rather than engaging with science which has the virtue of operating in a world grounded in reality rather than fantasy
silentw@mnutty yeah, if we aren't already there we're 95% there.
Jerry Orr@mnutty I feel this way sometimes, but I also think of the 1859 Scientific American article deploring the growing popularity of chess. Perhaps part of getting old is lamenting the state of the next generation? Society changes, often faster than we do as individuals. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/19th-century-concern-trollingchess-mere-amusement-very-inferior-character-180953281/
I do agree that we tend to turn curmudgeonly as we age and the quote could be read as such.
That said, I would have hoped that aspirations to understand and place the scientific method at the center of our collective attempts to understand the world would have penetrated more deeply over the decades since WWII. I sense, if anything, that we have gone into reverse and that anti intellectualism is more prevalent.
@mnutty it certainly _feels_ like anti-intellectualism is growing, though I’d be interested to see empirical evidence of it (if that’s even possible). I absolutely share your disappointment that rigorous critical thinking and general scientific knowledge are not more widespread.
Marc Etienne@mnutty from the same book:
“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”
Shades of “The Big Lie”?
@mnutty it's been a few years since I last read the book but yes, I think Dr. Sagan mentioned the similarity to the Fascist movement in Europe. Also to PT Barnum, but mostly the revivalist preachers with their traveling shows.
I never thought of a Barnum / Facism combination, that makes sense, although I do feel bad for P.T, I’m guessing he wouldn’t have been a fan of Hitler / Mussolini / Franco