Anti- Intellectualism

[oldtimer]

I'd rather be a dot, than jot.

[codewritinfool]

I'm tired and just rambling here, so bear with me as I try to scrape together some general thoughts.

 

Seems to me that once upon a time we used to let the most learned person speak at functions.  That might be a professor, a pastor, or even a doctor.  People came from miles around to hear the smart person speak at whatever the event was.  It automatically favored someone smarter than the average.

 

These days, in the age of connectedness, everyone has a microphone.  Everyone can speak freely, and everyone can find an audience.  Suddenly we have people speaking that never got a chance before.  When you couple this with the fact that half the people have an IQ less than 100, you get lots of just plain stupid ideas thrown around.

 

People don't read as much anymore.  Video is king.  Kids are mesmerized by it, they can just switch off the thinking parts of their brains and take it in.  In addition, some time ago we started the "everyone gets a trophy" nonsense, and as a result, we now have more than one generation that believes that their ideas are just as valid as anyone else's, never mind the facts.  Smart kids are "nerds", while jocks and cheerleaders enjoy better social status.  

 

True knowledge on a particular topic is almost guaranteed to be deeper than a wikipedia article, yet many many people seem to think that given Google and a few minutes, they can become experts on most any topic.  When you couple that with the earlier thought that "everyone has a microphone", you get a Playboy model on television spreading lies and fear to thousands of moms and kids getting diseases we had virtually eradicated just decades before.  We get an actor who thinks he knows more than scientists about antidepressants because he's "done the research" while they're just trying to sell big pharma.  This is part of the, "well, experts built that bridge that collapsed" as if we should allow non-experts to do it.  Actors have become political and scientific experts.  So have musicians.  

 

When I was a kid, I used to have to borrow the neighbor's encyclopedia set to write papers because I didn't have a set of my own....   Now we have so much knowledge at the tips of our fingers and only moments away.  It is just unbelievable the amount of knowledge we can read if we want to, and instead we've reduced ourselves to sending funny cat videos.

 

Wow.

 

[Jeff Matthews]

4 hours ago, oldtimer said:

You're close, but still a fence sitter.  So far, as you can tell, I have indicted all sides...

Ah!  So as long as you evenly distribute your spurn, you're off the fence?  Is that what I'm supposed to understand?  

[Jeff Matthews]

3 hours ago, oldtimer said:

Where are the Faulkners of our times?  The Buckleys?

Busy making money?

[oldtimer]

56 minutes ago, Jeff Matthews said:

Ah!  So as long as you evenly distribute your spurn, you're off the fence?  Is that what I'm supposed to understand?  

Nah.  I figure you understand.  You just never declared whether you think there is a general tone of anti-intellectualism or not.

[oldtimer]

45 minutes ago, Jeff Matthews said:

Busy making money?

Lol.  Maybe, but then they are not contributing to the greater culture if we don't know who they are?

[Jeff Matthews]

15 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

Nah.  I figure you understand.  You just never declared whether you think there is a general tone of anti-intellectualism or not.

They still have those TED Talks, etc., and I honestly don't know whether those are any more or less popular than Buckley.  Buckley was a popular guy, but I don't know how many people actually kept up with him and paid close attention.  I know when you guys post a video of him from time to time, I have clicked and become bored in less than two minutes.  Those days are certainly gone. 

[Travis In Austin]

Define intellectualism. 

 

It isn't dead at all in the classical sense.

 

If you are referring to debate on political ideology in the US, it ended when WFB died.  Chris

[Gilbert]

6 hours ago, dwilawyer said:

it ended when WFB died.

 

I remember W.F. Bush well.

[Gilbert]

13 hours ago, oldtimer said:

So you disagree that there is a common thread of anti-intellectualism present today?

 

YES, it' the same as it ever was.

 

 

 

I think you give the media at large too much credit. Smart people don't sell.

[oldtimer]

11 hours ago, dwilawyer said:

Define intellectualism. 

Maybe defining or at  least expanding on the concept as I previously attempted---from the link:

The writer Isaac Asimov, speaking of this, said that "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism

[billybob]

8 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

Maybe defining or at  least expanding on the concept as I previously attempted---from the link:

The writer Isaac Asimov, speaking of this, said that "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism

Amen

[RT FAN]

I would agree with the esteemed Isaac Asimov's comment regarding the cult of ignorance in America. To support my assertion I offer as proof the Kardashians. A family so loathsome, that the mother prostituted her daughters in exchange for fame & cash. How is it that these vulgar people are held up as cultural icons in our society? They represent everything wrong in our society and have profited handsomely from it.

  I read somewhere that Kylie crushed the stock price of Snapchat by posting that she doesn't use the platform anymore and that her 25 million social media followers took note. From what I read Snapchat immediately signed her to a contract to use the Snapchat App.

 

 This brought several thoughts ot the forefront.

1.)  How is it possible that 25 million people give a damn about what Kylie says or does? Do they have nothing else in their lives that matters?

 2.) The head of Snapchat must need to keep the price of his stock up to keep his lovely wfe, Miranda Kerr, in dresses, as there is no way she would give him the time of day if he wasn't a 14 standing on his wallet.

 3.) Was this just a clever ploy by momager Kris Jenner to extort a contract out of Snapchat and add to the clan's growing pile of cash? Is she the smartest person in the room, beating a social platform CEO at his own game all the while exploiting the masses for their own benefit?

 

 It saddens me that I even bothered to post this here and perhaps confirmed my own anti-intellectualism. I think I will go listen to my Klipsch speakers.

[Jeff Matthews]

49 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

The writer Isaac Asimov, speaking of this, said that "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been.

So, per Isaac, there is no trend.  It just always has been.  It probably goes hand-in-hand with democracy, where the opinions of simple people actually matter.

[oldtimer]

That  is correct.  I think the strength of the thread (trend) ebbs and flows over time, and that now it is most definitely flowing.

[Jeff Matthews]

1 minute ago, oldtimer said:

That  is correct.  I think the strength of the trend ebbs and flows over time, and that now it is most definitely flowing.

This could be because the game is pretty evenly matched - in fact, so close that 1 candidate wins the popular vote, while the other wins the electoral college.  When it's that close, the opinions of simple people matter even more.

[oldtimer]

1 minute ago, Jeff Matthews said:

This could be because the game is pretty evenly matched - in fact, so close that 1 candidate wins the popular vote, while the other wins the electoral college.  When it's that close, the opinions of simple people matter even more.

Perhaps, but more important to me is the more broadly based cultural aspect.  Of course this is reflected in voting trends, but that seems more of an expression of symptom rather than an actual problem.  You mentioned Buckley earlier from video posts past.  It was his writing that made him the intellectual force that he was.  The writing of Asimov---the same, as I also mentioned regarding Faulkner.  I am not seeing a lot of great literature today.  It could be my fault, and why I offered here to be shown the way by anyone who may know better.  The same is true in the art world.  Is there any new art that is high end as opposed to base scrabbling?  Is it really true that 25% of Americans believe in a geocentric solar system?  What percentage believe in a flat earth?  "Cult of ignorance" indeed.

[Jeff Matthews]

8 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

Perhaps, but more important to me is the more broadly based cultural aspect.  Of course this is reflected in voting trends, but that seems more of an expression of symptom rather than an actual problem.  You mentioned Buckley earlier from video posts past.  It was his writing that made him the intellectual force that he was.  The writing of Asimov---the same, as I also mentioned regarding Faulkner.  I am not seeing a lot of great literature today.  It could be my fault, and why I offered here to be shown the way by anyone who may know better.  The same is true in the art world.  Is there any new art that is high end as opposed to base scrabbling?  Is it really true that 25% of Americans believe in a geocentric solar system?  What percentage believe in a flat earth?  "Cult of ignorance" indeed.

I hear you, but I just can't subscribe to the level of pessimism you display to society.  This is the Age of Information.  It's easy to find people on the net who say idiotic things.  That's half the fun  - trolling is.  The reality is that in this day and age, people are more informed on everything than they ever were, including politics, cooking, cleaning techniques, car and appliance repair, building electronics, etc.  I bet Buckley, in his time before the Age of Information, could never have been as multi-talented as today's typical "simple-minded" person.  

 

How would you have expected people's behavior to be in order to live up to the good, old days of greater intellectualism?  What would they be doing differently?  Do you mean just being more skeptical before parroting things they hear and perhaps even researching first?

[oldtimer]

10 minutes ago, Jeff Matthews said:

What would they be doing differently?  Do you mean just being more skeptical before parroting things they hear and perhaps even researching first?

That sounds like a damned fine start.  I didn't start the thread because I have all the answers.  I hoped to find some, or at least foster a discussion of the issue.  To that I am pleased to see a modicum of success.  Getting back to your question, however rhetorical it may be, I'll demonstrate with an example that you hit upon.  One of the more repeated falsehoods I have seen is this:  "A single volcanic eruption spews more greenhouse gasses than all of man's activity burning fossil fuels in a year."  That is so false, so faraway from the truth, that it can only be considered a bald faced lie.  Where does lunacy like that even start?

[Jeff Matthews]

1 minute ago, oldtimer said:

I'll demonstrate with an example that you hit upon.  One of the more repeated falsehoods I have seen is this:  "A single volcanic eruption spews more greenhouse gasses that all of man's activity burning fossil fuels in a year."  That is so false, so faraway from the truth, that it can only be considered a bald faced lie.  Where does lunacy like that even start?

That is a good example.  I don't think starting the fib is reflective of the general population, so I would not compare the source to all the unwitting participants who pass it along.