Wherein the Fly Rants about Intellectual Snobbery, Bigotry, and Laziness
One thing that frustrates me more and more is the complete and total lack of intelligence and intellectual effort not only in America, but in the world at large. I've encountered several instances of it lately, from partisan statements made by wannabe political pundits to the so-called "science" that's doing everything it can to infect the intellectual discourse of the world. One of the issues, as I see it, is the rise of communications media - the Internet for starters, but more specifically online media like blogs and video sharing websites. That's right: YouTube. I've been saying for months now that YouTube isn't revolutionary, it's just another medium and I'm sticking by that. I honestly believe that YouTube won't have a disproportionate impact on the coming election, for example - as evidenced by the fact that the vast majority of the truly hardcore nerds on YouTube and in other online media are backing Congressman Paul, who has failed to gain serious traction even though he's been raising all kinds of money.
The instance that really set me off was so bad that I'm not even going to link to it, because it's so viral in its idiocy and ignorance that I feel an obligation not to subject a single individual to its overwhelming stupidity. The video features a guy who's wearing a sand-colored Army undershirt and an ACU boonie cap - obviously a soldier who's determined to use his service in the Army as credibility. He goes on to discuss a "rerun" he'd seen of one of the Republican debates, and describes an exchange between "Senator Huckabee" (for those of you who don't follow politics, Mike Huckabee was the governor of Arkansas, and there is a difference) and "Doctor Ron-Paul" (his inflection treats the name as if it's a single word, like Shaft or Rupaul or something). He puts the clip in question in his video, and then when it's done, he asks Governor Huckabee "Are you kidding me?" He proceeds to rant about the supposed iniquity of paying private contractors exorbitant salaries compared to the relatively low salaries of soldiers (apparently failing to understand that security contractors are paid a salargy commensurate with their experience and skills, both of which far exceed those of the average soldier), he complains about KBR and other contractors making billions of dollars (apparently failing to understand that both companies provide certain services that are available from no other company on the entire planet). He then proceeds to rail against Senator McCain's quote in the post-Thanksgiving debate that the message the troops sent home with him was "Let us win, let us win"; according to the intrepid videographer: "You know, Senator McCain, if you want to know the soldiers' opinion, you should ask 'em." As if Senator McCain made it all up? Anyone who's paid any attention to Senator McCain knows that he has more integrity than that, plus he's the most decorated and accomplished war hero of anyone running.
The guy goes on to rant, and rant, and rant, continually demonstrating his absolute lack of any discernible knowledge about anything that he talks about. He talks up Ron Paul, obviously ignorant of the fact - the fact - that Congressman Paul has demonstrated a complete and total ignorance of what Paul's foreign policy ideas would mean for the United States and the world. And unfortunately, this young man's entire credibility is based solely on being a soldier. I'm sorry ladies and gentlemen, but this is nonsense. I give this young man absolute credit, and I've lived my support for the military for nearly two years now every time I've shown up for work. I've known and worked and served with plenty of personnel - all of whom deserve our credit and thanks for their service, but some of whom are absolutely and totally daft. The more I heard words coming out of this young man's mouth, the more I knew that he had a great deal in common with a guy I used to work with who'd spent seven years in the military and deployed to five or six countries without learning anything of value about the world, or even how to pronounce words correctly. And YouTube gave him (the guy in the video, not the guy I used to know) a voice to spread his ignorant blather across the world.
Note: To anyone who's reading this and thinks that I'm denigrating soldiers and other service personnel, please keep in mind that I served in the Navy myself, and continue to serve my country as a contractor, nearly always working directly alongside military personnel without being accorded the prestige or benefits of actually being on active duty. I live my patriotism every day in the work that I've chosen, and I've made many of the same sacrifices by choice that our brave military members make when ordered to do so. I know I'm basically rambling myself by now, but my overarching point is that for all the respect that those who serve are due, their service alone does not grant them carte blanche credibility when they present opinions, ideas, or information for consumption in the public forum - they still have to make cogent and logical arguments that are based on facts, rather than merely saying "I went to Iraq, so this is how it is and I'm right."
Another example of this ignorance is being chronicled in an upcoming movie by Ben Stein entitled Expelled. I had immense respect for Stein before, and I have even more respect for him after having watched the "super trailer" for this movie (about nine minutes long, available on the website in Flash format). Stein has put together a film chronicling something that I saw a great deal of when I was in college: intellectual snobbery and outright hostility in academia, aimed at anything that doesn't tow a precise line on the issue of Darwinism. One of the emerging movements in science is the theory of intelligent design, which blends good old fashioned Darwinism with good older fashioned theism. Across the country and across academia, the very mention of intelligent design is being stifled. Ladies and gentlemen, when you stifle new ideas, does that reflect poorly on the people who are trying to present the new ideas for review and discussion? The answer is no: it reflects poorly on those doing the stifling. It makes them look as if there's something to hide. It makes them look as if they're scared. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be limits to discourse, mainly in the interest of decorum and procedure for the sake of orderly discussion. What I am saying is that the stifling of issues like the discussion of intelligent design are symptoms of a larger dysfunction in academia. The truth of the matter is that, more often than not, academics have more at stake than a simple desire to collect and process data, and apply that data to hypotheses. Whether these stakes are political, or theological (or in the case of those critical to the very discussion of anything that could bring religion and philosophy into the discussion, atheological), or economic, the supposed lack of bias in modern academia is a myth.
Note: An addendum a couple of days after I wrote the original post, to this last case. Another thing I've seen on YouTube in particular, and blogs to a similar degree, is this desire to basically sum up all of religion with catch phrases, eliminate any belief in anything having to do with the supernatural, and give the kind of fancy wisdom that barely lives up to the standards of a Bazooka Joe comic. "All the Bible is is a bunch of stories that help us develop an idea of how to live in harmony with our fellow man, nothing more." Great, how much scholarship did it take you to get to that thrilling and informed conclusion? The minimum amount possible, which is to say, none, huh? Another classic one from a guy I used to work with went something like "I don't necessarily think every religion has it all right, and I don't think every religion necessarily has it all wrong." Once again, a convenient position that allows one to make absolutely no commitment to living or believing a particular way, based on absolutely no study of anything at all, while simultaneously painting anyone who's religious as a misguided simpleton with good intentions. I don't know about all of you out there, but my faith isn't tied to a voodoo woman named Phyllis - it's based on thousands of years of history, and compelling archaeological, literary, and historical evidence by others, which I've been studying myself since 1997. It's something very serious to me, and whether people agree with me or not, I get pretty indignant about being dismissed out of hand by those practicing intellectual laziness and passing it off as progressive snobbery. If you're not into religion, just say so: "I'm not really that interested in religion." Or if you're a total jackass who's too lazy to read about what you're talking about, just say so: "I'm pretty much just a lazy bastard, so I'd better refrain from comment since my opinion isn't based on any facts or scholarship or information of any kind.
For another example of this, we can look at the issue of global warming. Anyone who questions whether or not climate change is happening is all but directly referred to as a heretic. The evidence is highly suspect, based on computer models (which are programmed by humans, making the programs themselves inherently subjective), extremely limited data about both recent history and the overall history of the world. The entire strength of the case for global warming is consistently cited on the basis of "concensus", despite the fact that there is a growing buzz from scientists who are either skeptical that global warming is happening, skeptical that human activity is playing anything more than a negligible role in it, or skeptical on both points. In spite of all this, anyone who speaks out is denounced and demagogued. With this overwhelmingly weak case for human involvement in global climate change, we're supposed to adopt policy initiatives like Kyoto, cripple international industry, drastically alter the way that we live our lives, and do it all on faith? For more information on this issue in particular, I once again highly recommend this speech by Michael Crichton. The state of this policy-based pseudo-science is absolutely unbelievable.
Now, I think it's only fair that I admit my own bias on these issues.
I support the Iraq War, I've supported it from the beginning, I supported it in 2000 when I joined the Navy and everyone was focused on when, not if, we'd be forced to confront the Iraq issue once and for all. I've been a skeptic at times, I've worried that we'd fail (mostly due to a decreasing lack of faith in the resolve of the American people, never through any belief that we weren't capable of accomplishing our mission there), but I've always made a point of educating myself about the history and background of the issue, and making my decisions based upon that. In fact, I even applied for jobs in both Afghanistan and Iraq, in addition to having supported the domestic war effort - I think that this, coupled with my informed and extensive research on the issue, give me some credibility.
With respect to intelligent design, I'm friendly to the concept - moreso than I was in high school or most of college, when I was fairly committed to a creationist point of view. I've done some study, not a lot (due mainly to the fact that my chosen specialties are history and international security, not biology or cosmology), but enough to know that Darwins theories and those derived from them, while interesting, are relatively weak on their own. Also, the overwhelming complexity and order in the universe make it highly unlikely, at least in my opinion, that there was no divine guidance in the formation of life, the universe, and everything. I'm an unapologetic theist, both due to observation and what I believe to be inspiration, and any concept I have of cosmology without a higher power of some sort, whether sovereign or not, is essentially impossible. Really, though, I think that the issue is largely trivial, as we're unlikely to ever collect enough evidence to say for sure, and even if we were able to prove comprehensively how the universe and life came into being, the actual benefits of having this knowledge would be either next to nil or actually nil, particularly compared to the cost of finding it out in the first place. And even if we found all of that out, it's highly unlikely that it would change my religious or philosophical beliefs - it simply doesn't matter to me in the long run how it all came into being, because here I am.
And regarding climate change, I think that the evidence that some sort of fundamental, unequivocal, revolutionary change in the Earth's climate is occurring is highly suspect. I think that the hypothesis that these supposed changes are influenced either largely or even partially by human activity is phenomenally weak. I also think that, if it is happening, it's going to be happening whether we all live like we're in the stone age or not. I actually have no issue with making some changes to some of our industrial processes and lifestyles - I think that consumption for the sake of consumption is bad for both mind and spirit, and I believe in the reasonable preservation of natural resources and habitats. However, I think that most the motivations that most folks are espousing with regard to climate change are all wrong - capitalists and conservatives should be the ones calling for better business and industrial practices on the grounds of conserving our planet through good stewardship (both of which are conservative values) and being efficient in industrial and business practices (thus maximizing both consumer trust and profit through reduction of the ratio of costs/waste to end products). The more you listen to liberals (or "progressives" as they like to call themselves) who are passionate about climate change, the more you hear about some of their alternative motivations. Quoth former Vice President Gore:
For other reasons anyway? Given that Vice President Gore is one of the most leftist politicians in America today, you can probably guess what those "other reasons" are. If we're going to confront possible (but unproven) changes in the Earth's climate, it's going to have to be through adaptation to incoming heat, not some vain attempt to chemically influence a change that we as humans more than likely play little or no part in. (For comedic but accurate allegories of this, look here, here, and here.)
Easier communications through broadcast media, print media, the Internet, and other outlets is a great thing, but there is a dire need to improve the quality and transparency of nearly all aspects of our national and global discourse. So, what are the first steps in this process? We need to denounce Congressman Paul as a heretic (joking), burn every copy of Darwin's "The Origin of Species" and smash every computer that contains it electronically (kidding), and pass an international law requiring every automobile production plant to start building Hummers and only Hummers, and the same law must require every single driver to drive a Hummer (kidding).
I feel better, don't you?
The instance that really set me off was so bad that I'm not even going to link to it, because it's so viral in its idiocy and ignorance that I feel an obligation not to subject a single individual to its overwhelming stupidity. The video features a guy who's wearing a sand-colored Army undershirt and an ACU boonie cap - obviously a soldier who's determined to use his service in the Army as credibility. He goes on to discuss a "rerun" he'd seen of one of the Republican debates, and describes an exchange between "Senator Huckabee" (for those of you who don't follow politics, Mike Huckabee was the governor of Arkansas, and there is a difference) and "Doctor Ron-Paul" (his inflection treats the name as if it's a single word, like Shaft or Rupaul or something). He puts the clip in question in his video, and then when it's done, he asks Governor Huckabee "Are you kidding me?" He proceeds to rant about the supposed iniquity of paying private contractors exorbitant salaries compared to the relatively low salaries of soldiers (apparently failing to understand that security contractors are paid a salargy commensurate with their experience and skills, both of which far exceed those of the average soldier), he complains about KBR and other contractors making billions of dollars (apparently failing to understand that both companies provide certain services that are available from no other company on the entire planet). He then proceeds to rail against Senator McCain's quote in the post-Thanksgiving debate that the message the troops sent home with him was "Let us win, let us win"; according to the intrepid videographer: "You know, Senator McCain, if you want to know the soldiers' opinion, you should ask 'em." As if Senator McCain made it all up? Anyone who's paid any attention to Senator McCain knows that he has more integrity than that, plus he's the most decorated and accomplished war hero of anyone running.
The guy goes on to rant, and rant, and rant, continually demonstrating his absolute lack of any discernible knowledge about anything that he talks about. He talks up Ron Paul, obviously ignorant of the fact - the fact - that Congressman Paul has demonstrated a complete and total ignorance of what Paul's foreign policy ideas would mean for the United States and the world. And unfortunately, this young man's entire credibility is based solely on being a soldier. I'm sorry ladies and gentlemen, but this is nonsense. I give this young man absolute credit, and I've lived my support for the military for nearly two years now every time I've shown up for work. I've known and worked and served with plenty of personnel - all of whom deserve our credit and thanks for their service, but some of whom are absolutely and totally daft. The more I heard words coming out of this young man's mouth, the more I knew that he had a great deal in common with a guy I used to work with who'd spent seven years in the military and deployed to five or six countries without learning anything of value about the world, or even how to pronounce words correctly. And YouTube gave him (the guy in the video, not the guy I used to know) a voice to spread his ignorant blather across the world.
Note: To anyone who's reading this and thinks that I'm denigrating soldiers and other service personnel, please keep in mind that I served in the Navy myself, and continue to serve my country as a contractor, nearly always working directly alongside military personnel without being accorded the prestige or benefits of actually being on active duty. I live my patriotism every day in the work that I've chosen, and I've made many of the same sacrifices by choice that our brave military members make when ordered to do so. I know I'm basically rambling myself by now, but my overarching point is that for all the respect that those who serve are due, their service alone does not grant them carte blanche credibility when they present opinions, ideas, or information for consumption in the public forum - they still have to make cogent and logical arguments that are based on facts, rather than merely saying "I went to Iraq, so this is how it is and I'm right."
Another example of this ignorance is being chronicled in an upcoming movie by Ben Stein entitled Expelled. I had immense respect for Stein before, and I have even more respect for him after having watched the "super trailer" for this movie (about nine minutes long, available on the website in Flash format). Stein has put together a film chronicling something that I saw a great deal of when I was in college: intellectual snobbery and outright hostility in academia, aimed at anything that doesn't tow a precise line on the issue of Darwinism. One of the emerging movements in science is the theory of intelligent design, which blends good old fashioned Darwinism with good older fashioned theism. Across the country and across academia, the very mention of intelligent design is being stifled. Ladies and gentlemen, when you stifle new ideas, does that reflect poorly on the people who are trying to present the new ideas for review and discussion? The answer is no: it reflects poorly on those doing the stifling. It makes them look as if there's something to hide. It makes them look as if they're scared. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be limits to discourse, mainly in the interest of decorum and procedure for the sake of orderly discussion. What I am saying is that the stifling of issues like the discussion of intelligent design are symptoms of a larger dysfunction in academia. The truth of the matter is that, more often than not, academics have more at stake than a simple desire to collect and process data, and apply that data to hypotheses. Whether these stakes are political, or theological (or in the case of those critical to the very discussion of anything that could bring religion and philosophy into the discussion, atheological), or economic, the supposed lack of bias in modern academia is a myth.
Note: An addendum a couple of days after I wrote the original post, to this last case. Another thing I've seen on YouTube in particular, and blogs to a similar degree, is this desire to basically sum up all of religion with catch phrases, eliminate any belief in anything having to do with the supernatural, and give the kind of fancy wisdom that barely lives up to the standards of a Bazooka Joe comic. "All the Bible is is a bunch of stories that help us develop an idea of how to live in harmony with our fellow man, nothing more." Great, how much scholarship did it take you to get to that thrilling and informed conclusion? The minimum amount possible, which is to say, none, huh? Another classic one from a guy I used to work with went something like "I don't necessarily think every religion has it all right, and I don't think every religion necessarily has it all wrong." Once again, a convenient position that allows one to make absolutely no commitment to living or believing a particular way, based on absolutely no study of anything at all, while simultaneously painting anyone who's religious as a misguided simpleton with good intentions. I don't know about all of you out there, but my faith isn't tied to a voodoo woman named Phyllis - it's based on thousands of years of history, and compelling archaeological, literary, and historical evidence by others, which I've been studying myself since 1997. It's something very serious to me, and whether people agree with me or not, I get pretty indignant about being dismissed out of hand by those practicing intellectual laziness and passing it off as progressive snobbery. If you're not into religion, just say so: "I'm not really that interested in religion." Or if you're a total jackass who's too lazy to read about what you're talking about, just say so: "I'm pretty much just a lazy bastard, so I'd better refrain from comment since my opinion isn't based on any facts or scholarship or information of any kind.
For another example of this, we can look at the issue of global warming. Anyone who questions whether or not climate change is happening is all but directly referred to as a heretic. The evidence is highly suspect, based on computer models (which are programmed by humans, making the programs themselves inherently subjective), extremely limited data about both recent history and the overall history of the world. The entire strength of the case for global warming is consistently cited on the basis of "concensus", despite the fact that there is a growing buzz from scientists who are either skeptical that global warming is happening, skeptical that human activity is playing anything more than a negligible role in it, or skeptical on both points. In spite of all this, anyone who speaks out is denounced and demagogued. With this overwhelmingly weak case for human involvement in global climate change, we're supposed to adopt policy initiatives like Kyoto, cripple international industry, drastically alter the way that we live our lives, and do it all on faith? For more information on this issue in particular, I once again highly recommend this speech by Michael Crichton. The state of this policy-based pseudo-science is absolutely unbelievable.
Now, I think it's only fair that I admit my own bias on these issues.
I support the Iraq War, I've supported it from the beginning, I supported it in 2000 when I joined the Navy and everyone was focused on when, not if, we'd be forced to confront the Iraq issue once and for all. I've been a skeptic at times, I've worried that we'd fail (mostly due to a decreasing lack of faith in the resolve of the American people, never through any belief that we weren't capable of accomplishing our mission there), but I've always made a point of educating myself about the history and background of the issue, and making my decisions based upon that. In fact, I even applied for jobs in both Afghanistan and Iraq, in addition to having supported the domestic war effort - I think that this, coupled with my informed and extensive research on the issue, give me some credibility.
With respect to intelligent design, I'm friendly to the concept - moreso than I was in high school or most of college, when I was fairly committed to a creationist point of view. I've done some study, not a lot (due mainly to the fact that my chosen specialties are history and international security, not biology or cosmology), but enough to know that Darwins theories and those derived from them, while interesting, are relatively weak on their own. Also, the overwhelming complexity and order in the universe make it highly unlikely, at least in my opinion, that there was no divine guidance in the formation of life, the universe, and everything. I'm an unapologetic theist, both due to observation and what I believe to be inspiration, and any concept I have of cosmology without a higher power of some sort, whether sovereign or not, is essentially impossible. Really, though, I think that the issue is largely trivial, as we're unlikely to ever collect enough evidence to say for sure, and even if we were able to prove comprehensively how the universe and life came into being, the actual benefits of having this knowledge would be either next to nil or actually nil, particularly compared to the cost of finding it out in the first place. And even if we found all of that out, it's highly unlikely that it would change my religious or philosophical beliefs - it simply doesn't matter to me in the long run how it all came into being, because here I am.
And regarding climate change, I think that the evidence that some sort of fundamental, unequivocal, revolutionary change in the Earth's climate is occurring is highly suspect. I think that the hypothesis that these supposed changes are influenced either largely or even partially by human activity is phenomenally weak. I also think that, if it is happening, it's going to be happening whether we all live like we're in the stone age or not. I actually have no issue with making some changes to some of our industrial processes and lifestyles - I think that consumption for the sake of consumption is bad for both mind and spirit, and I believe in the reasonable preservation of natural resources and habitats. However, I think that most the motivations that most folks are espousing with regard to climate change are all wrong - capitalists and conservatives should be the ones calling for better business and industrial practices on the grounds of conserving our planet through good stewardship (both of which are conservative values) and being efficient in industrial and business practices (thus maximizing both consumer trust and profit through reduction of the ratio of costs/waste to end products). The more you listen to liberals (or "progressives" as they like to call themselves) who are passionate about climate change, the more you hear about some of their alternative motivations. Quoth former Vice President Gore:
And we sometimes emphasize the danger in a crisis without focusing on the opportunities that are there. We should feel a great sense of urgency because it is the most dangerous crisis we have ever faced, by far. But it also provides us with opportunities to do a lot of things we ought to be doing for other reasons anyway.
For other reasons anyway? Given that Vice President Gore is one of the most leftist politicians in America today, you can probably guess what those "other reasons" are. If we're going to confront possible (but unproven) changes in the Earth's climate, it's going to have to be through adaptation to incoming heat, not some vain attempt to chemically influence a change that we as humans more than likely play little or no part in. (For comedic but accurate allegories of this, look here, here, and here.)
Easier communications through broadcast media, print media, the Internet, and other outlets is a great thing, but there is a dire need to improve the quality and transparency of nearly all aspects of our national and global discourse. So, what are the first steps in this process? We need to denounce Congressman Paul as a heretic (joking), burn every copy of Darwin's "The Origin of Species" and smash every computer that contains it electronically (kidding), and pass an international law requiring every automobile production plant to start building Hummers and only Hummers, and the same law must require every single driver to drive a Hummer (kidding).
I feel better, don't you?
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