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News Gathering vs. Confirmation Bias
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[S]cience is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time – when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key 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; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, 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.
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 (New York: Ballantine Books, 1996) at p.32.
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[S]cience is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time – when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key 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; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, 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.
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Tag Archives: politics
The Unchained Goddess (1958)
We’ve known about anthropogenic global warming for decades and decades… “The Unchained Goddess” (1958), produced by Frank Capra and the fourth film in the Bell Laboratories Science Series (1956-1964): Even now, man may be unwittingly changing the world’s climate through the waste products of his civilization. Due to our release through factories and automobiles every […]
California governor signs controversial right-to-die bill
Physician-assisted suicide will become legal in California under a bill signed into law today by Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown, making it the fifth state in the nation to give terminally ill patients a legal right to die. As hard as it may be to believe in today’s ultra-political culture, my Mom–who was an RN–told me […]
Also tagged family, government, health, personal
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Tennessee’s Cosmetology Board Thinks It Can Regulate a Software Company
Or, could it be that the board is using its regulatory power at the behest of private businesses who don’t want to compete with Project Belle? That seems to be case.
Also tagged government, reason, tennessee
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How Donald Trump, Rush Limbaugh, and Other Blowhard Goliaths Meet Their David
Donald Trump’s ongoing feud with the parents of a slain soldier, like Rush Limbaugh’s personal attacks on a student before it, shows the modern bloviator’s greatest weakness: his inability to walk away.
Also tagged reason
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‘Why Can I Never Seem To Say The Right Thing?’ Weeps Trump Into Pillow
The Onion: “Every time I open my mouth, the words come out all wrong,” Trump reportedly said in between long, heaving sobs, his voice muffled by the pillow as he occasionally pounded a balled-up fist into the mattress.
Also tagged humor
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Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam snubs President Obama again
Chattanooga Times Free Press: [Haslam spokesman David] Smith didn’t provide any information about what the governor would be doing today. There are no events listed on his public schedule. Stay classy. That’s what you get when you vote for the “lesser of two evils”. REMEMBER FOLKS: The lesser of two evils is still evil, and […]
Also tagged bullshit
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Fundamental rights may not be submitted to a vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections
I find this particularly compelling, and it dispenses with dissenting arguments in toto: Of course, the Constitution contemplates that democracy is the appropriate process for change, so long as that process does not abridge fundamental rights. Last Term, a plurality of this Court reaffirmed the importance of the democratic principle in Schuette v. BAMN, 572 […]
Supreme Court extends same-sex marriage nationwide
Associated Press on Twitter: MORE: The Supreme Court’s ruling means 14 states will have to stop enforcing their bans on same-sex marriage Tennessee being one of those 14 states. Not to pat myself on the back, but I’ve been calling this one for a decade on Equal Protection grounds, even before that awful ‘Tennessee Marriage […]
Federal Court Rules Mass Metadata Collection Not Authorized by PATRIOT Act
The government takes the position that the metadata collected – a vast amount of which does not contain directly “relevant” information, as the government concedes – are nevertheless “relevant” because they may allow the NSA, at some unknown time in the future, utilizing its ability to sift through the trove of irrelevant data it has […]
Also tagged government, reason
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“…or you can believe the Senator with the snowball.”
Scientific American’s ’60-Second Science’ podcast for March 2, 2015: Climate Skeptic Senator Burned after Snowball Stunt Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe carried a snowball onto the Senate floor to insinuate that climate change was not real, after which Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse torched Inhofe’s argument. Steve Mirsky reports “You can believe NASA and you can […]
Also tagged climate, denialism, government, science
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