Have a Happy New Year!

I recommend this book by CS.

Exactly what he is talking about here...

in maintaining our democracy and our freedom than ..... GUNS ????

Now there's a bold statement: Ignorance -- willful ignorance, especially --
would permit the government to run US!

What actions would the GOP recommend that we citizens take:

To get a clue OR to get a gun ?
To be informed, based on facts, OR to have opinions based on beliefs?
To vote OR to suppress another's vote ?
To be involved in civics OR to be passive ?
To question authority OR to trust it implicitly ?
To reject or to participate in their "know nothing" game ?

he predicted that America would become so stupid and ignorant...just what the elite wants....stupid slaves .
So glad I live in Canada but the neighbor may destroy us too along with it..

that train don't get too comfortable, sadly.

we have arrived at that point, it would be nice to know how to correct the problem! Or at least have a means of correcting the problem, it seems the problem has reinforced itself by arming itself to the teeth. Seems like we have a "Hal" situation on our hands.

Very prophetic, and now we are there.

Kubrick intentionally made 2001:ASO a philosophical allegory about a runaway technology-God and even used imagery evoked by Nietzsche's Zarathustra to underscore it.

Most Americans do not understand basic physics... they seem to convert teaching opportunities into ventures like The Learning Channel, which became a way to sell distractions and sugary crap. We love our sugary food and electronic distractions... and our greed.

I wonder what would happen in our society if everyone had to revisit lessons on the second law of thermodynamics every 7 years.

no joke... "I wonder what would happen in our society if everyone had to revisit lessons on the second law of thermodynamics every 7 years. "

Surely they'd have to think!

I recall a particular day in college back in the 90s when one of my elder professors and a dear personal friend was handing out a quiz in French culture and history class. He was nonchalantly telling us that it was "...nothing to fear, only a little quiz and if we would just think about it, everything will be fine." to which I responded, "Asking people to actually think... isn't that against the law in the United States?" He burst out laughing and assured me that he thought I was probably correct about that.

I have a firm suspicion that too many people in this culture believe it is their god-given-right to be ignorant by choice. And look what it's done for us. I know people who have just graduated from college who can't spell or who know the difference between to, two and too (or then and than which is my personal pet peeve). It's kind of sad but very telling. And they don't even seem to know enough to be aware of what is happening to their lives and won't bother to pay attention until it "happens" to them and disrupts their utopian lives. Everything's okay until it isn't and then they are shocked, shocked I tell you.

A masterpiece that's still very relevant today.

He talked about the many Americans that don't trust science.
If I didn't know the interview was from years ago I would have thought it was a current interview today.
A lot of what we are mortified by isn't new.
It's been the status quo for decades.

The "Righties"® actually celebrate ignorance.

I mean, look at their posts, their signs and what they're saying. They are illiterates, stupid and proud of it.

is so woefully ignorant. Years ago people use to be curious and saw education leading to a more interesting and productive life. Now, many mock education. We are moving toward Idiocracy so fast.

Try telling that to the burger flipper who is working next to the person who has a college degree, has $20,000 to $60,000 in education debt, and cannot find a suitable job for their education level.

Scientists need to find a way to reach the uneducated who have no curiosity. Is curiosity even a trait that can be developed?

high end which will eventually lead to the failure of our economic system for the masses, and already for some.

It needs to be addressed, but no politician wants to touch it because they are fed by the skewed wealth and would never be elected, hence, we live with this mess we call disaster capitalism.

Unless the money is removed from politics, this country is headed straight down the tubes! It will eventually fail.

History repeats, hopefully it will be peaceful.

But it is in full flower now-and will only get worse.

really want to get the money out of politics, they would never get elected if they proposed getting disaster capitalism under control. There needs to be a catalyst to effect change but short of absolute disaster I'm not sure what that catalyst will be.

It is frustrating to them to be told by scientists one year that coffee, or any other food or beverage, is bad for you and the next year that it is good for you.

GOP will have NOTHING to do with, cuz they're way too busy thumping their Bibles in their phony indignation of A to Z. A bunch of haters and obstructionists they are. So why do we always have to meet them "half way," even when we win the Majority?!?!

hate everything. It's hard, for example, even to glimpse at DD and not see a bunch of haters. And, I'm willing to bet many in the US want to emulate them.

Carl was probably the highest point our species has ever reached because he could see and articulate the future based on the looming reality of human nature's mistakes in collision with technology. With the relatively new ability to encompass the world with information, finally science had a springboard in Carl that could warn and enlighten us with observations of life and its place in the universe. He was a prophet minus the delusion.

I do miss Carl.

Not far from the truth, unfortunately.

I fear the ensuing downward spiral.

...He said: "we don't run the government. The government runs us."

That's true enough.

BUT...

WHO runs the government? How OWNS the government -- and largely the judiciary, all the way to the top (USSC - Scalia and Thomas)?

BIG. CORPORATIONS. And the wealthy (Koch Bros, etc). Monsanto runs the FDA. NRA controls congress. Exxon-Mobil wrote our "energy policy". And so on.

Before we can address/remedy "we don't run the government" - we need to ask "well, WHO IS running the government, then?

THOSE people who ARE running the government - that's who runs us - NOT "the government".

Ignoring this piece - eliminating it from the conversation - this is what leaves open the door for the "big government is bad" argument. Because the "big bad government" is controlling everything and "taking away our freedom".

But it's not the "big bad government" that's doing it. It's the BIG. BAD. CORPORATIONS. And the big wealthy folk. Get control of OUR government away from THEM and back into "we the ACTUAL people"'s hands, then we might have something remotely resembling a representative democratic republic. Until then...well. We're slaves to/for the corporations and the wealthy.

And the "big bad government" is just a TOOL they use to keep power away from us and in their hands.

It works too. REALLY well.

We saw it when the "death panels" propaganda was so successful. People RAILED about "death panels" when the ACA was being written. But these same sad idiots don't mind CORPORATIONS making life and death decisions for them (based on what life-saving treatment, drug or procedure insurance companies arbitrarily agree to pay for or not). They don't mind that at all. That's fine. But they didn't want "big bad government" making any such decisions for them (not that it would anyway in a single-payer or nationalized system, it wouldn't) -- but you see here how and why ignoring this FACT - this part of the conversation - is useful for the GOP, TP, and the media. Ignoring it - not ever mentioning it - makes "propelling the propaganda" about "big bad government" very easy.

Big government isn't our problem. If WE are running and controlling that government. But we're NOT. And that's the problem.

And it's the entities who ARE running and controlling it that we need to deal with.

I've said before even if the most progressive , leftist people were elected to office , I don't know how much they would be able to accomplish because of the systemic corruption in our government. I've been reading the book "This Town'' and a successful lobbyist was quoted as saying that all he has to do is dangle a well paying (future) job in front of a politician and he's got them in his pocket. I'm convinced we won't see single payer or any other type of reform until we have campaign finance and some type of lobbying reform. It's not so much all the money that's being spent on campaigns , it's where the money is coming from. This makes politicians beholden to their big money donors not the people.

And all of God's people said, "Amen".

contagious, and it's often a cop out for being a loser. Many are bred to be ignorant. Often I wonder, anymore, if it's organic behavior or learned behavior. As a technologist, and I certainly don't want to sound arrogant, I can definitely say technologists are walking/running away from the rest of society, and much of society doesn't even have a clue. And that said, have you ever heard anyone in congress speak intelligently about technology. Yes, some are very sharp and perceptive, but most sound like fools.

Further, some R&D today, for example, can be done in low cost labs, some you pay a rental fee, often there is little oversight about what is going on.

We're on a dangerous path, but rather than some of the populace embracing knowledge they mock those with advanced education ... and often those in high school, for example, with an interest in the sciences.

Frankly in the big picture IMO, looking into the future, the US will be left behind. Technologists in some parts of the world do not deal as much with a willfully ignorant populace.

It seems many in the US think the only solution to anything is to bomb and kill people in other parts of the world.

I certainly can't predict the future, but I can say just thinking about the current path it does not look too promising.

As one of my friends say when I'm on this rant, "so, what do we do?" That, is where I fall short for an answer. It's redirecting the collective consciousness, and I don't know how to accomplish that in a big way. I use to think a democracy was the answer, but more and more we seem to have lost a democracy in the US. Rather, often, vast money enables great power, and politicians line up and the feeding troth, and that seems to be how the collective consciousness is influenced.

I suppose one outcome will be the technologists well might live in the future, and vast segments of the population will dwell in lower orbs as mundane waifs of sorts, and I find that very sad.

It takes place in the year 2077. The US and Canada have merged into one country called the North American Union and our form of government is corporate authoritarianism. Instead of a President and Congress , the US is run by a board of directors. The sad part is that I can totally see this happening.

of the populace seems to love authoritarianism ... thinking of the teabaggers, the religious right, etc. They seem to love authoritarianism and subservient people, and setting themselves up as the inquisitioners.

What I see missing is critical thinking. Many today seem to be a bunch of jumbled reflexes and hence easily led by someone simply pushing their buttons. The republicans often use this tactic quite well.

Technology is already controlling most of the populace, NSA is one example ... what they know ... what could be done with the data.

I think we've reached the tipping point, or almost. When I see the popularity of DD, and the outrage, I think we can't be too far off, sadly.

I think Sagan is right on, but I actually think there are more and more inquisitive, science-minded people out there every day. The internet has opened up information sharing in a whole new way.

They're just not the people who answer polls about "GOP views on Creationism".