Why We Can't Have Nice Things

Steve Benen calls it scientific illiteracy; I call it how religion makes you stupid.

Maddowblog:

Gallup released the results of a new national poll this morning on science, and unfortunately, modern biology didn't fare well: "Forty-six percent of Americans believe in the creationist view that God created humans in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years."



SNIP

The country just can't afford confusion on a grand scale about scientific basics -- not just about biology, but also in areas like climate science. When activists, mainly on the right, launch anti-science initiatives, such as changing school curricula, there are real and broad consequences in the long term to public confusion.

The competitive edge the United States used to enjoy is vanishing. The country needs to start taking science seriously again -- our economy depends on it -- and ignorance costs far too much. Results such as the new Gallup poll on biology should serve as a wake-up call.

Neil deGrasse Tyson gave a lecture a few years ago that stuck with me on the "philosophy of ignorance," in which he said a lack of appreciation for basic scientific principles will hurt America's scientific output, which has traditionally been the nation's largest economic engine.

"If nonscience works its way into the science classroom, it marks ... the beginning of the end of the economic strength this country has known," Tyson said.

To care about American economic competitiveness is to care about science.

But this is about much more than economic competitiveness, which will be restored as soon as we eliminate taxes on the rich, according to the same people who think an invisible sky wizard created the world six thousand years ago.

This is about turning our public school system into Sunday School. This is about half of American voters being incapable of distinguishing facts from myths. This is about straightforward arguments on how to run the country always losing out to "god says ..."

This is how confusing religious freedom with bowing to religious bullying turns a whole country stupid.

In Kentucky as in many states, teachers are not even allowed to mention the word "evolution," forced to substitute the meaningless "change over time." I know at least one former high school biology teacher who took a demotion away from the subject he loved rather than continue to lie to his students.

Freakazoids vote. Do you?