Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Neil deGrasse Tyson vs. the right: “Cosmos,” Christians, and the battle for American science

Salon

The real reason conservatives are freaking out about Neil deGrasse Tyson: He's laying bare their worst hypocrisies
He's doing a fine job of it and it's about fucking time.

The religious right has been freaking out about Neil deGrasse Tyson’s “Cosmos” for what feels like an eternity. And, while the theological complaints seem laughable for their rancor and predictability, it’s time we thought harder about what they represent, because the Christian right’s “Cosmos” agita actually indicates a far deeper problem in religious conservatism — the selective acceptance of Enlightenment values. Religious conservatives have selectively adopted the legacy of liberal Enlightenment, from free speech to science, and jettisoned it when it does not suit their narrow ideological aims.
Tiny brains, tiny aims.

The scientific consensus about global warming must be untrue, because, as Dr. Innes writes in “Left, Right and Christ,” the world is “not a glass ornament that we might accidentally destroy … we are not capable of destroying it, whether by nuclear weapons or carbon emissions.” [...]
He's right. We will not destroy the Earth. The sun will do that in about 5 billion years. We can, however, destroy life on earth as we know it.

There's a lot more to read in this piece and video too.

Sheldon Cooper on "The Big Bang Theory" described religion perfectly as "Pre-enlightenment mythology" and I won't even try to improve on that.

4 comments:

syrbal/Labrys said...

Sadly, the more the Religious Wingtards go off on every available bit of science and logic, the more I think the only thing limitless in our "closed system" world is the Ignorance fostered by superstition!

bearsense said...

Kindda boils down to "I got mine, how'd you do," eh ??
I really dislike these bastards.
Bear

Gordon said...

The problem with their superstition is they want to write it into law so we're forced to abide by the same stupid superstitions as if they really mattered which they don't.

It's more like "I've got mine and fuck you".

CAFKIA said...

I think a more accurate statement is that we can (and are doing so) destroy the ability of the earth to support life in he human and other higher order mammalian paradigm.

Of course, that is too complicated to be understood by the Faux Noise crew so, we can just go with your blurb.