I have a foreboding of America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time–when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all of the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; with our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness.
And when the dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites now down to 10 seconds or less, lowest-common-denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.”
― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
I idolize Carl Sagan. Definitely one of the 5 people of history I would have dinner with.
I first read The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark about 20 years ago when I took my first faltering steps out of my religious beliefs. The book is definitely worth a second read if I can ever get the time. Carl Sagan was a thoughtful and considerate person from the so-called Silent Generation. I grew to admire his courtesy and composure, especially when in the midst of disagreement. The world would do better with more people like him in it.
I own that book. It’s a great read.
What an absolutely perfect characterization of our moment. Dumber and Dumbest.
Well Nobody if he stepped into eternity with the belief that “THERE IS NO GOD” and without Jesus Christ he is now in a Christless hell screaming and crying and gnashing his teeth and wishing he had never been conceived! 😭
Well Anybody, you’ll soon find out when you go and join him.
Exactly right! 👍💯
So much for a loving God, eh Anybody.
wow. So.. are you saying your god wants people to follow it out of terror and fear? Thats quite the message. Jesus could have saved a lot of time and effort if he just had said “follow me or else”.
Well, Anybody, as commenter Obstacle Chick wrote here recently, this allegedly all-loving god of yours is gonna give us non-believers fireproof bodies so we can experience the agony of burning forever. Oh, and I’m Lol-ing here remembering my heathen nanna and grandad whom always seemed to have problems with their ill-fitting false teeth decades ago. Maybe after death, they got brand new dentures to ‘gnash’ with in order to fully appreciate the eternal torture that your obnoxious, ugly deity enjoys watching.
Oh look- it’s Reviled and Fired again, under another moniker this time,as ” Anybody.” Busted,RF !!
“Anybody,” you’re a fool if you think you can trust a hell-creating god. Even if you did drink the Jesus-Juice, there’s nothing whatsoever to stop such an evil god from just tossing you into the flames for shits and giggles. In the context of eternity and a god that would condemn people to unending torment, no one is truly safe.
Maybe its evidence of a human need to worship someone or something but I worship Carl Sagan’s intelligence and humble wisdom. A prophetic essay like that one makes him a deity of sorts.
I enjoyed that book, less prescient than just extrapolating the state of the world in the 1990s. One difference is that Carl couldn’t foresee is, while the internet somewhat eliminated the soundbite problem, it also splintered common culture into a plethora of shards. Everyone feeds from their own specialized teat. Cosmos (the Cosmic Calendar) recently came up in a movie based on a Stephen King story, “Life of Chuck”, it really made me want to watch the series again. Sagan is an excellent presenter and Cosmos is a wonder presenting the universe as revealed by science. (Also recommend “Life of Chuck”, though it isn’t free on any service yet.)
Things are bad and getting worse. I wonder if we will ever recover. There’s an entire industry of outrage where people are making so much money stoking hate and anger, and politicians are using that to gain power.
“ There’s an entire industry of outrage where people are making so much money stoking hate and anger, and politicians are using that to gain power.”
I could not have said it any better, OC. I keep trying to figure out who is actually benefiting from the outrage industry. It’s easy to just say, “Dear Leader Trump” and leave it at that. But to me it goes way deeper than that. Personally I think the countries that despise our democracy (i.e. Russia, Iran, N. Korea, PRC) are driving alot of this. I think Dear Leader is just a useful idiot for these folks, who allowed himself to be extorted long ago due to his personal immoral (or amoral) habits.
My wife and I (married 30 years) have different religious and political beliefs. But we have also both evolved as we have aged together. At the end of the day, beliefs and $2.00 will get you coffee at the Speedway Folger’s cafe. I can have a smug feeling in my superiority of belief, but if I take it to asshole-land, and anger my wife to the point that we cannot stand each other others presence, what have a I gained? Not a damn thing. The challenge is how to do you maintain your thoughts, still respect and love the other person, and keep an open mind to alternative arguments all at the same time?
I wish more folks would do a deep dive into the Spanish Civil War of the 1930’s. It seems to have a lot of similarities to today. There is still bitterness and arguments about the conduct of both the Republicans and the Facists (Falangists) who came out on top. Arguing a liberal point of view, you get accused of ignoring all the priests, nuns and other Catholics that the Communist led forces executed. Arguing a conservative point of view gets you accused of “both-sides-ism”, and also ignoring the very real fact that Franco executed far more people than the Republicans ever did, including about 120 some odd Catholic religious who supported Basque separatists. In my view, which is probably not the perfect one, neither side can claim the entire market on virtue or atrocity. Each side thinks “the ends justified the means”, or like the person who succeeded Pol Pot as the leader of the Khmer Rouge (“Brother # 2”) said at his trial in Cambodia, “Mistakes were made”.
But at the end of the day, the far right took their revenge in a way that went way beyond a sense of justice for the atrocities committed by their opponents on the far left, similar to how the State of Israel has gone way beyond retribution for the horrible October 7th massacre by Hamas. Their zeal for “never again” has turned them into what they themselves detest.
I would love to see a day where conduct and behavior towards others becomes the focus, instead of having to have the exact same “right beliefs” as the person you are interacting with. Also, learning when to say “enough”, stop arguing and rejoice in the good things and people we have in our lives, because as much as things suck right now, there are always the things to be grateful for.