Martin NuttyWriting almost 30 years ago #CarlSagan worried about a country poorly educated in #science
Has has foreboding been realized?
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.