The “war” between certain kinds of religion and science is
continuing unabated. The village
atheists such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris use this kind of thing to
lambast religion in general, just as Christian Fundamentalists give all kinds
of Christianity a bad name. In
fact the war between religion and science is entirely a function of a certain
kind of religion, one that claims revealed scriptures are infallible, seeking
to preserve ignorance when all the evidence suggests otherwise.
In Utah there has even been a serious
suggestion to abolish the senior year of high school to ‘save money.’ This would really put Utah’s kids first in line for being rejected for college. The GI Bill made it possible after WWII for millions of returning GIs to go to
college. It helped lay the
groundwork for the prosperity that followed. The mentality evident in Utah is the exact opposite, and
will have the opposite effect. America
is sliding into a society where public debate and discussion is dominated by
the most willfully ignorant citizens, as anyone who has paid attention to the
health care debate cannot help but notice.
Deeply ignorant individuals are
claiming that the record snows in the midAtlantic states somehow rebut global
warming, never mentioning the unheralded warmth that has forced Vancouver to
provide artificial snow for the Olympics and the even more disturbing evidence
that the snows might be a result of global warming. (For one thing, warm water evaporates more into the atmosphere, where it
falls as rain or snow.)
Despite the overwhelming belief by qualified scientists that
global warming is happening, and the possibility that this winter’s record snow
in the east might be a sign of what’s to come, the denialists oppose additional research on the issue. I can only assume that most fear their
fantasies will be ever more completely exposed for the drivel that they
are. Better not to look.
Now a recent report indicates that
Texans are growing progressively more ignorant of basic science as each year
passes. For example, 30% of Texans
believe human beings lived simultaneously with dinosaurs. Fpor them, the Flintstones might be a kind of documentary. Another 30% “don’t know.” That is 60% of the allegedly sentient population of a state evidencing
ignorance I would not have expected in a 6th grader. Of course we know how all or nearly all
vote…
The German philosopher Friedrich
Nietzsche, with whom I often disagree, nevertheless made a penetrating
observation when he wrote in Twilight of the Idols,
“One pays heavily for coming
to power: power makes stupid. . . . politics
swallows up all serious concerns for really spiritual matters. Deutschland,
Deutschland über alles – I fear that was the end of German philosophy.”
I think future historians and
philosophers and theologians may make a similar observation about 21st
century America. Many Americans
became so besotted with a sense of their power over the rest of the world that
they forgot they were born with minds to think, let alone hearts to love. Ego and wishful thinking and fear of
exploring the boundaries of their ignorance have taken the place of thinking
and learning. They embraced Power
in three fateful forms:
1. A religion that elevates power
above all other values.
2. A way of relating with people
unlike themselves that elevates power above all other values.
3. An approach to politics that
elevates power above all other values.
If Human history demonstrates
anything, it is that such large scale willful stupidity is a quick and
guaranteed way to lose power.
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