What's really behind the RW attacks on science?

It's not just creationism. It's a refusal to accept the data on climate change; stem cell research; defunding education; ignoring the consequences of depleted Uranium; refusal to fund basic research of all types, etc. Willful ignorance and attacks on knowledge wherever you turn. Why? What's the underlying agenda here?

Sure, the fundies are victims of self-inflicted brain damage, but they really don't set the rules. Somebody much smarter than them is really calling the shots and using them as just one phase of the overall attack. The mass media are on board with the dumbing-down too.

One obvious symptom of this campaign lies in the fact that almost all of the new scientists and engineers in the world are non-Americans, largely Asians. What's it all about? Who wants to kill off American intellectual development and why?

Whatever answers to these questions pop immediately to your mind are going to be superficial and almost certainly wrong. It's much deeper and more intentional. It's not just about allowing corporations to run roughshod over the environment, or about preparing the world for the outsourcing of high-tech jobs. There's something more to it. But I don't know what.

What's your theory?

to accomplish this? The robber barons of the 19th century, for example, throve on the science and technology of their age.

because it tries to explain things . . . and "proof destroys faith" . . . (something like that . . . Douglas Adams had a great bit about the Babel Fish being so incredibly pointing to the existence of God that it was used to prove the non-existance of God . . . with God vanishing in a puff of logic).

The Catholic Church refused to accept that the Earth revolved around the Sun (supposedly because the scientist "insulted" the pope at the time) for 400+ years . . .

Remember that only the elite could read, and the Church taught you to read (for quite some time) . . . ignorance is the easiest way to lead the masses . . . but, as The Brain said to Pinky, "Who would want to lead them?"

This is the marriage that could end the Federation if it's allowed to continue.

That's exactly the way the RWers want it. Smart, but not TOO smart.

Remember, a lot of the upper echelon got to where they are through connections and muscle, not smarts.

They want a population just educated enough to keep the system functioning, but not enough people educated enough to question the system. It seems pretty simple to me.

of the world, to reduce people's capacity to think rationally, to reduce people's curiosity, to promote nihilism.

In short: to dumb people down.
The more dumb people are the easier it is to deceive them, the richer the pickings for the con-men who rule us.

the genes. Their sexuality is determined at conception. RWingers don't want this information because "God does not make mistakes" and they regard homosecuality as a "mistake."

http://www.crooksandliars.com/

Stolen from this thread, which is pretty funny:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1335411

I really think this is the bottom line - they just think that it's God's will for people to survive until the Rapture, and once that happens they can thumb their nose at the world. We'll all just be getting what we deserve anyway.

The Robertsons of the world are con men who live off fleecing their flocks (like shepherds everywhere, I guess), but I don't for a minute imagine they actually believe their own tripe. I think they're middle management, in charge of herding the sheep in directions that someone Up There (and I don't mean some deity) wants them to go.

in my experience, I never met any who were just total charlatans. Not that there aren't a lot running around out there, but real Bible church fundies don't go much for the flashy TV preacher type. They don't speak in tongues, so Robertson is a heretic to them. None that I knew ever had much money, so they are mistrustful of wealthy preachers. They don't buy into the health/wealth doctrine promoted by the megachurches. The people I knew in my 15 years of fundamentalism were all as sincere as could be. BUT, they just truly believed that they didn't have long here on earth - that God would come "in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." So they just didn't really feel any obligation to protect the environment at all.

Don't get me wrong - these are not just sweet pacificist Quakers here. These types are the true "dominionists" who would love to see all gays thrown in jail or worse, women back in the home pregnant and barefoot (no concerns about overpopulation), government run by the church, under some sort of Christian Sharia law, etc. But they are not the same as the TV-watching, Christian-on-Sunday types you see lampooned on TV. These people are COMMITED. They believe they are unerringly correct in their interpretation of the Bible. You cannot reason with them. If you manage to get one to open his eyes, he will be utterly banished from all contact with anyone in the church - including family. Divorce is allowed in these cases, but no other - not even for sex outside marriage.

They really hate real, irrefutable evidence of their crimes.

The dominance of rational thought and science over religious influence marked a turning point in western civilization. Perhaps in their minds they are just trying to restore the good old days, when the religious leaders chose the political leaders, the people were serfs who did the bidding of the nobles, and uh... we died by the millions from Plague... Yeah, the good old days! :hide:

of the issues you list, they would end up agreeing with evil liberals. They are instructed from the pulpit and other places that that is not per biblical teachings and evil liberals are wrong and make shit up just for political reasons. Ergo, the lemmings come in pavlovian fashion at least once a week bringing bucks to the collection plate to have their "beliefs" repounded into their heads. To them, beliefs trump facts on any and every issue. Ignorance is truly bliss; and a lot of them vote providing a big block of support for whomever captures their hearts. I would consider it an extremely sad way to go through life.

I welcome any "conservative" to set me straight.

Eyes faith as a pretty weak reed to base your behavior on. If you're not comfortable in your faith, or fear that "weaker" vessels will lose their faith in the face of science's indifference to it, you feel threatened. Obvious, but (IMO) true.

Which is not to say that opportunists haven't taken the natural tension between science and faith and wielded it as a political weapon for a whole litany of only somewhat-related causes -- because they have.

They CREATE THEIR OWN REALITY!

Yes they do, they REALLY do...

What's YOUR beef, you negative Nelly, you.

Try FAITH!

Why do you hate America?

facts are incompatible with the fantastical thinking that is required to believe the BS, therefore, the source of those inconvenient facts must be crushed.

It is also impossible to convince the educated person that war is peace, right is wrong, night is day, etc. therefore we must eliminate education, and ideally, replace it with obedience.

Once this is accomplished, there will be no significant resistance to the "New World Order", and the sheeple will be content to spend their lives in the pursuit of the goals set them by the ruling class.

we will all be gone....

Even though global warming had thrust the masses into poverty and misery, the rich still "had it made".

They believe that as long as they are rich they are insulated from any problems that affect the rest of the world.

it's just several powerful groups.

"My mind is made up. Don't confuse me with facts." Most people, including many of us on the left, have long held ideas that we just can't dump. It's personal, and not just a matter of learning new things-- it gets down to who we are and how we simply can't discard some of our most cherished ideas. Our own identities are diminished by these changes.

Some people do have a vested interest in the status quo and they attempt to manipulate the rest of us, but they wouldn't get very far if it wans't basic human nature to resist too much change.

I think there has been a general trend away from science education for decades. People do not understand the reasoning used to come to conclusions about things like stem cell research.

We also fall into a dichotomous line of reasoning where if one thing is seen to be true--another must be false.

So if you believe that evolution is true; then you must believe that God doesn't exist. If you believe that global warning is a reality; you must believe that anyone driving a car (using fossil fuels) is causing it. If you are pro-environment; then you are anti-business.

It's classic false dilemmas one right after another and it demonstrate poor reasoning skills on both side of the debates. In other words there may be (and often are) other explanations and/or solutions to problems,

to determine if possible explanations hold water. Do you think the RW wants a population geared towards questioning what they're told?

One of the first things he did was basically decapitate the intelligentsia. Of course, many if not most or almost all of them were Jewish, but one thing helps another, so to speak.

RW'ers are by nature authoritarian and hierarchical. They want top down dissemination of information. Even those on the bottom rung would rather be told what to do and think. They view scientific and intellectual pursuits as dangerous and subversive of their power. Who's in charge is more important than who knows what in an intellectual sense. To them, knowledge and information is a tool used to get and keep power. The accuracy and truth of the knowledge and information is less important than how many people they can get to believe it.

Educated people tend to be more democratic by nature. They prefer knowledge be shared and distributed more equally. They feel that scientific and intellectual curiosity and freedom promotes the general welfare. They care more about who knows what (intellectually) and less about who's in charge. In their view, power should be used to protect and support those who seek new knowledge. It doesn't matter to them how many people believe something, truth and accurach is what matters.

This is hardly a new phenomena. The fundies have been at it for decades. One of the problems is that the RWers have some advantages over the LWers because of how they think, as the comparison above shows. The trick is for us to discredit them when we can.

Another good example. Most of the shows you see on Discovery, National Geographic and the Science Channel are produced either in Canada, or by the BBC. Check the credits. Sure, they interview some American scientists, but the shows aren't done here.

If you ever read one of the evolution debates at free republic, they are pretty equally split on the matter.

I personally am not a scientific-minded person and have little knowlege of it over a high school level, and I wasn't very good at it then. If my faith in God was based solely on believing that the Bible was the literal word of God, it would collapse when challenged by real-world facts that contradict scripture.

If I believe that the Bible is inspired by God, I don't have to believe that every verse, book or even individual writer has the status. Paul's words are not those of God, for example. I doubt that when he wrote his letters to the early churches he thought that even 2000 years later, his letters would still be considered the Word of God by many christians.

Spirituality is a whole different matter, and it doesn't need intellectual justifications for it's existence.

Science is the forum that most people learn analytical thinking.

Who needs facts and the ability analize the reality that you live in when you can be swayed by cute catch phrases?---republicans!

A method that has been heavily used by republicans: There is a an undisputable fact that puts the rw in a bad light. How do they deal with it? They make up some bizzar counter argument that has no basis in reality, fact, or even sanity. People w/o analytical skills can easily be confused on the issue and are swayed by the snake-oil saleman.

It is much easier to get people to vote against their interests if they lack the ability to analize information that is presented to them. Politicians are in the marketing business. Facts often get in the way of whatever they are trying to sell---see War on Iraq.

Look at China, Russia. Killed, exiled or sent to a gulag.
Here in American the Repugs paint anybody with any brains as the devil incarnate.

Because an intelligentsia is going to be able to respond eloquently and with facts against propaganda. And a dictatorship cannot flourish in an environment where facts are freely disseminated.

Reality has a Liberal bias. that is the root of the rpoblem....

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

They NEED the populace to be stupid so the elite 1% own our society.

Back in the revolutionary days, the conservatives were the ones that sided with royalty and monarchs.

faith is easy.

Sid

anti-technology attitude resulting from the fear of a nuclear holocaust during the cold war. The dangers of nuclear weapons made the West lose it's faith in science and technology, a trend I find very disturbing. It's not just a right-wing thing, I am horrified by the rampant ludditism among my fellow enviromentalists, for example.

That is, they attack science in general because they're still hung up on Creationism.

No price is too high. Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.

Research funding:
http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd/guitotal.htm

(For specific disciplines, it was cut or remained stable; those stuck squealed, those who got more funding toodled off to do research.)

K-12 funding:
http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/10facts/edlite-chart.html

(Funding per student, of course, is not the relevant criterion; in many instances some subsets of students require far higher per capita spending, and skews the average.)