Hat-tip io9
I often strain for sober-sounding methods to explain my disgust with the villifying of “intellectuals” or “elites” in American culture; or why I get as furious as I do with Climate Change deniers, Creationists, Intelligent Design proponents and all other manner of superstitious wastes of skin (see, there I go again…) rather than just ignoring them.
Fortunately, Neil deGrasse Tyson (who’s supposedly going to step into Carl Sagan’s shoes for Seth McFarlane’s “Cosmos” revival – yes, really) helpfully explains it by means of a simple infographic that shows the United State’s standing as a scientific-innovator dwindle to near-nothingness within a mere decade:
This is why I DON’T get mad when people in Asia, Europe, Japan etc. gloat about how stupid my country is now percieved to be, because it’s increasingly TRUE and it has very simple, tangible sources: America, as a whole, does far too much “believing” (religiously and otherwise) and not nearly enough THINKING. We prize moral-righteousness over intellectual prowess, we hold “common sense” superior to educated analysis, we slash funding for research to meet short-term budgetary goals and expect “the market” to pick up the slack (it won’t, “the market” LIKES a stupid population) and we treat people walking around in the 21st century denying cold hard proven facts like evolution, climate-change etc as having “beliefs” or “a different opinion” instead of obvious mental failings not worthy of ether discussion OR respect in a modern world.
We’re having an election soon. Not ONE Republican can hope to be nominated if he doesn’t swear to his constituents that he believes the proven fact of evolution to be false, and no one of EITHER party can hope to win period without reassuring a significant number of people that they believe – sincerely and without a hint of doubt or questioning – that there is an invisible man living in the sky calling the shots via a ten-item “don’t” list. These are the signs of a society that is not only failing, but that deserves to be failing.
So while the fundamentalists, hardcore believers, absolutist pro-lifers, “traditionalists,” creationists, homophobes, climate-deniers and all the rest MAY in fact include some otherwise perfectly nice individuals among their ranks, collectively the ignorance they espouse and the anti-progress, anti-reason political leaders, candidates and movements they support are murdering my future; and I feel wholly disinclined to continue being “tolerant” of them. Differences should be tolerated, but ignorance should be corrected – and if it cannot/will-not BE corrected it deserves only to be shunned.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
Uhm, Bob, do you have any proof that it is the presence of climate-change deniers, creationism believers etc. that has caused the number of produced peer-reviewed scientific reports to dwindle? Otherwise you're just using your gut feeling and predetermined bias to let you draw unscientific conclusions. Or, using your own terminology:
You're a Believer. You believe it is the wide acceptance of disregarding scientific arguments as “opinions” that causes the downturn in scientific output. While I agree that it is awful that science gets neglected as opinion, that doesn't prove that it has caused the downturn.
I believe (but I admit I haven't done enough research to know) that it is the economic situation that has cut the spending in areas of science, due to costly wars, the health care reform and the economic collapses. Not the existence of Believers.
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@sylocat
How can anyone read what I read and conclude that I said Darwin first came up with evolution. I said the exact opposite.
“The understading of heredity and how it applies to change in a population predates Darwin”
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I like how Canada is completely gone except for a few spots that more than likely represent the U of A and Toronto.
I'm just kidding. This isn't funny at all.
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These are NOT the kind of people you can “win over”…period…no matter how “nice” your delivery. His whole POINT here is that these sort of people DO NOT DESERVE respect or tolerance. Enough of this “my ignorance is as good as your knowledge” bs from these knownothings. All we can do is try to keep them from continuing to successfully use media and public education to spread their idiocy. Polite objection HAS NEVER worked so far against people so strongly COMMITTED both to WILLFUL ignorance and to ENFORCING said ignorance due to seeing it as divine mandate. Make no mistake. This is a WAR of religion or reason, of searching for knowledge versus a deliberate and forceful campaign to stop knowledge and DESTROY current knowledge. These people WANT you and your children to be prejudiced ignorant and actively hateful of independent thought, as it contradicts the fictional reality that represents the only meaning in their empty thoughtless bovine existence. Obviously our current make-nice strategy is failing because it is plain to see that in America ignorance is winning while the most atheist nations have by far the best standard of living, education, and mental health. What would YOU do to stop the fundies from winning? Because tolerancebof the intolerant has been tried and is NOT the answer.
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This guybis a perfect example of one kind of wllful ignorance. Evolutionary biology has helped medicine. Astronomy Ill concede as less practical, but so what? You have NO human curiosity except if it makes you a buck? How sad. Pursuit of knowledge, apart from any fiscal ends, elevates manking intellectually and (dare I say it) spiritually. (No..not religious here btw.)
Also without government funding…no internet..no GPS… no cleaner energy (no incentive in private enterprise for it)…no “pharma companies finding cures” on MOST diseases because there arent enough victims of a lotbof diseases to make drug sales for them profitable…
Also..nice straw army you defeated there. He is calling WILLFULLY ignorantnpeople who want OTHERS to suffer ENFORCED ignorance “wastes of skin”…
Ooohh.forgot one..particle colliders are villified as totally without practical use..except for thousands of technologies developed off knowledge gained from them. NO private company would have made that kind of speculative investment.
Lasers as well. Were an academic curiousity in college labs until someone realized their applications.
The most laughable logical fallacy is at the end.”if it matters so much why arent you out doing it?”
Is that REALLY the best “argument” you could find to close with.
Apparently you think medicine and pharmaceuticals and computers are useful. But since you arent out programming computers to make better chemicals to treat diseases, apparently you are not allowed to have any opinion about thosebthings at all, at least if you wish to be logically consistent.
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You seem to be arguing that political expediency is the determining factor of everythin that should or shouldnt be done. If you are NOT trying to say this then I have NO idea what your pointnis here. Also, if we had edison everything would have been invented due only to business reasons. You ARE NOT really that stupid as to believe ALL the things mentioned would somehow have magically sprung fromnothing. I say that because anyone that stupid probably couldnt turn on a computer. So this is laziness, TOTAL intellectual dishonesty, or you are just a massive troll. Probably a little of each.
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This doesn't come as all that intelligent, either – more hateful really. It's not all about intellectualism. And believing in “God” doesn't mean an invisible man in the sky to everyone. What you've done in your article is essentially demonstrate first-handedly the true problem with a lack of intelligence – it's closed-mindedness – thinking you have all the answers. You're just as “dumb” as the “creationists” you mention – you're just sitting on a different side of the religious spectrum. Oh, if one day there could just be intelligent discourse in this country – but no one wants to talk, they just want to push their own beliefs on everyone else, or condemn those that don't believe the same. That's my biggest problem with the so-called “intellectual” movement in this country – it's no better than the rantings of any other dumbass. Until people learn how to talk and think, together, this country is going NOWHERE. There's too much EGO in this country… THAT'S the problem!
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