patrick.net
An Antidote to Corporate Media
1,264,319 comments by 15,112 users - Blue, HeadSet, socal2, The_Deplorable online now
Where did the anti-science/technology mentality of American society come from?
invite response
2011 Jan 29, 2:06pm 22,085 views 113 comments
« First « Previous Comments 112 - 113 of 113 Search these comments
Cook County resident
2011 Dec 6, 3:01am
Richard Feynman
Carl Sagan
Those are good choices.
I should have addressed Kevin's point more directly rather than nit-pick on the role model issue.
I'm not sure that we are actually becoming more hostile to science and technology itself. The nerd-heros of such action shows as Bones or the CSI shows just the Tontos of the modern world. There's not nearly so much gunplay on the medical shows such as House.
But we have a strange, almost worshipful, attitude about the rich and famous. And the chance of some corporate or university employed scientist becoming a rich celebrity are now just about zilch.
FortWayne
2011 Dec 6, 4:45am
But the hero is never the guy who builds technology. It's always that guy's boss or child. More often than not, the technology maker is the bad guy.
Ironman was the only good guy who could afford it.
« First « Previous Comments 112 - 113 of 113 Search these comments
Something I've noticed a lot as I've gotten older is that american society has become increasingly hostile towards science and technology.
Now, obviously we love the fruits of this stuff. We love our computers, smartphones, GPS, and all the rest. But when it comes to actually building and developing these things? It's all derogatory.
To a certain extent, I can understand subsets of the anti-science people, particularly those bits that disagree with your worldview. I understand why religious people don't want to study biology, chemistry, geology, or even physics in some cases. These sciences frequently lead to uncomfortable confrontations with one's faith.
To a lesser extent, I can understands subsets who want to ignore scientific findings that might point to them doing something harmful to themselves, society, or the planet. Nobody likes to be forced to change what they're doing.
But I really don't get the anti technology crowd. I'm talking about the people who deride anyone who enjoys applied math and science with any number of terms intended to separate them from the "normals". The movies that portray engineers as, at best, socially awkward support personel for the hero. The people who actually look down on anyone who happens to be good at math.
It wasn't always like this. We used to actually have engineers and scientists as role models. We used to consider technological advancement an important factor in growing and developing our economy. We even used to have engineers and scientists who were politicians. There hasn't been a president with an actual technology background since Hoover (though, perhaps that explains the bias...).
During the state of the union, Obama mentioned having a "sputnik moment". His examples were lame. I think that's because there hasn't been a genuine sputnik moment since sputnik itself. What we really need is a new real moment. A "holy shit" moment, if you will, where we actually see some massive breakthrough that comes from a major foreign competitor, ideally China.
It isn't enough to see a country like China simply match something that we've done. China putting a man on the moon or developing a stealth bomber isn't going to spur us to action. China figuring out how to accomplish something major, like a real solution to getting off of fossil fuels or a major breakthrough in medicine might do it.
#politics