Thursday, February 23, 2012

"Unable to distinguish between what’s true and what feels good, we slide, almost without noticing, into superstition and darkness"

There’s another reason I think popularizing science is important, why I try to do it. It’s a foreboding I have—maybe ill-placed—of an America in my children’s generation, or my grandchildren’s generation, when all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when we’re a service and information-processing economy; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest even grasps the issues; when the people (by “the people” I mean the broad population in a democracy) have lost the ability to set their own agendas, or even to knowledgeably question those who do set the agendas; when there is no practice in questioning those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and religiously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in steep decline, unable to distinguish between what’s true and what feels good, we slide, almost without noticing, into superstition and darkness.
-- Carl Sagan, Wonder and Skepticism
Posted by Tony Mach Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2012
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2 comments:

  1. Gabriella KadarFriday, February 24, 2012 8:24:00 PM

    Carl Sagan died in 1996. So, is your point that he was a prophet, a visionary, an observant fellow?

    Many of your recent posts appear to have no context. As a person who writes a blog, your point for posting would go a long way towards maintaining the interest of readers.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Tony MachSaturday, February 25, 2012 6:32:00 AM

    I'm sorry, I collect material I find to be useful. In this case, his observation to distinguish between what "is true" and what "feels good" was something I could not add more too.

    But I understand that I don't provide a nice narrative someone could follow like a novel or a TV series. It is a classic "web log", interspersed with an "actual" post when I can find a topic and muster myself to write one such post.

    Maybe I should separate this into a "web log" and a blog with just the articles?

    ReplyDelete

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