Question Everything! |
The dumbing down of America
By Carl Sagan'
Extract from, "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark" - 1995 - By Carl Sagan.
October 19, 2020 "Information
Clearing House" - I have a foreboding
of an America in my children's or
grandchildren's time - when the United States is
a service and information economy; when nearly
all the key manufacturing industries have
slipped away to other countries; when awesome
technological powers are in the hands of a very
few, and no one representing the public interest
can even grasp the issues; when the people have
lost the ability to set their own agendas or
knowledgeably question those in authority; when,
clutching our crystals and nervously consulting
our horoscopes, our critical faculties in
decline, unable to distinguish between what
feels good and what's true, we slide, almost
without noticing, back into superstition and
darkness.
The dumbing down of America is most evident in
the slow decay of substantive content in the
enormously influential media, the 30-second
sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less),
lowest common denominator programming, credulous
presentations on pseudoscience and superstition,
but especially a kind of celebration of
ignorance. As I write, the number one video
cassette rental in America is the movie Dumb and
Dumber. Beavis and Butthead remains popular (and
influential) with young TV viewers. The plain
lesson is that study and learning - not just of
science, but of anything - are avoidable, even
undesirable.
No Advertising - No Government Grants - No Algorithm - This Is Independent Media
We've arranged a global civilization in which
most crucial elements - transportation,
communications, and all other industries;
agriculture, medicine, education, entertainment,
protecting the environment; and even the key
democratic institution of voting - profoundly
depend on science and technology. We have also
arranged things so that almost no one
understands science and technology. This is a
prescription for disaster. We might get away
with it for a while, but sooner or later this
combustible mixture of ignorance and power is
going to blow up in our faces.
A Candle in the Dark is the title of a
courageous, largely Biblically based, book by
Thomas Ady, published in London in 1656,
attacking the witch-hunts then in progress as a
scam 'to delude the people'. Any illness or
storm, anything out of the ordinary, was
popularly attributed to witchcraft. Witches must
exist, Ady quoted the 'witchmongers' as arguing,
'else how should these things be, or come to
pass?' For much of our history, we were so
fearful of the outside world, with its
unpredictable dangers, that we gladly embraced
anything that promised to soften or explain away
the terror.
Science is an attempt, largely successful, to
understand the world, to get a grip on things,
to get hold of ourselves, to steer a safe
course. Microbiology and meteorology now explain
what only a few centuries ago was considered
sufficient cause to burn women to death.
Ady also warned of the danger that 'the Nations
[will] perish for lack of knowledge'. Avoidable
human misery is more often caused not so much by
stupidity as by ignorance, particularly our
ignorance about ourselves. I worry that,
especially as the millennium edges nearer,
pseudoscience and superstition will seem year by
year more tempting, the siren song of unreason
more sonorous and attractive.
Where have we heard it before? Whenever our
ethnic or national prejudices are aroused, in
times of scarcity, during challenges to national
self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our
diminished cosmic place and purpose, or when
fanaticism is bubbling up around us - then,
habits of thought familiar from ages past reach
for the controls.
The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of
light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons
begin to stir.
Ed Note
The information available on these pages does not enjoy the support of the vast majority of our citizens, in fact it enrages a great many people. Yet, we are tasked to share what little we know in the hope that there are others who fully appreciate the struggle that our country and our species face. If you are one of those few people who share this concern please support our work by clicking this link.
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Thank you.
Tom Feely
Extract from, "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark" - chapter 2 - 1995 By Carl Sagan. Read the book for free here. http://www.metaphysicspirit.com/books/The%20Demon-Haunted%20World.pdf
Carl Edward Sagan (November 9, 1934 – December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator.