This quarter I'm taking physics and chemistry. A big step into my new science path. I'm really happy to embrace this new discipline. It seems like the right thing to do in a climate of Rick Santorum, the rise of literal bible interpretations, a mistrust of science, and the current anti-intellectualism world we're creating. What is going on! Yuck!
I'm a little scared about these courses. I'm trying to really focus. I think I can do it if I just study really hard.
I'm reading in the intro of my physics text about pseudoscience and the author is really speaking to this poisonous intellectual climate that is threatening all the advances of the last few centuries:
"Four centuries ago, most humans were dominated by superstition, devils, demons, disease, and magic in their short and difficult lives. Life was cruel in medieval times. Only through enormous effort did humans gain scientific knowledge, overthrow superstition, and gain freedom from ignorance. We should rejoice in what we've learned -- no longer having to die whenever an infectious disease strikes or to live in fear of demons...Yet there is cause for alarm when the superstitions that people once fought to erase come back in force, enchanting a growing number of people. There are now more than 20 thousand practicing astrologers in the US who server millions of credulous believers. A greater percentage of Americans today believe in astrology and occult phenomena than did citizens of medieval Europe. Few newspapers print a daily science column, but nearly all provide daily horoscopes. Although goods and medicines around us have improved with scientific advances, much human thinking has not." Paul G. Hewitt
So, sad. This needs to change. We need scientists to solve the energy crisis causing climate change.
I'm going to keep hard working at science classes, and see where this takes me.
