Anti-intellectualism Is Killing America

[Pyrrho]

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I am not sure who you are asking.

I think the primary reason is religion.  It is very antagonistic to critical thinking.  Religion, in fact, depends on poor critical thinking for its survival.  But that is not the only factor.  

Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, there was an existential angst about our future, which kept many policy makers interested in promoting science as a way of making sure that they did not get ahead of us in everything.  For example, if you examine the history of Sputnik, the first satellite, it was the Soviets being ahead of us in space.  That terrified policymakers, and so we poured massive amounts of money into science and technology.  It was patriotic to study science, to keep us ahead of the Soviets.  But we do not have that motive any longer with the breakup of the Soviet Union.  So we do not have the same focus any longer.  That might be why we canceled our Superconducting Super Collider.

There are also various corporate interests involved (which is mentioned in the article).  Business depends on people buying things, not on them making good buying choices.  If people are easier to sucker, that, at least in the short run, is good for many businesses.

And there are politicians who benefit from a lack of critical thinking.  Some of our politicians would never be elected if their constituents were all intelligent, reasonable, and good at critical thinking.

I think in connection with that is the history of the Republican Party over the past few decades, becoming entangled with fundamentalist Christians, which has not done the country any favors.  It is pushing us backwards, or trying to, and has had some successes in pushing us backwards.  It has had a corrupting influence on our educational system, including subjects in science and sex education.

There are likely other factors involved.

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Thanks for the reply - I'm curious to know if you truly think religion is the root of ignorance because I see it merely as part of it -

Religion is both a cause of ignorance and is caused by ignorance.  It is not the sole cause of ignorance.  (And it is not the only result of ignorance either.)  Religion flourishes among ignorant people, whereas well-educated people tend to be less religious.  This is seen both in terms of societies as a whole, and among individuals within societies.

If you mean to be asking about the origins of ignorance and religion, I think that ignorance obviously predates religion, and religion was a primitive way of trying to understand the world.

It seems that in America as long as you know how to read the bible you can be a pastor and preach the word of Jesus, while in countries like Italy there is a strong Catholic tradition of educating priests in subjects like philosophy, history, literature, languages, etc - Regardless of what you think about the Catholic church.

I somehow doubt that actual reading ability is necessary to be a preacher in the U.S.  Very likely, the exact details of what one must do vary from state to state, but it is probably little more than filling out a form (which someone could do for you if you were illiterate).  Assuming, of course, that one wants to be able to perform legal weddings, etc.  Otherwise, you probably don't need to even fill out a form.

Of course, if you wanted to be associated with a specific religious denomination, then you would also have to meet their requirements, whatever they might be.

Curiously, I come from a country where a lot of people are ignorant because of a past dictatorial political regime, but people always encourage education - My grandparents were little educated, my grandmother doesn't know how to read and write, but she always tells me to study hard and become a wise person to succeed in life. The fact I know how to speak two languages fluently is something that surprises many people - My girlfriend is my age and she can't speak English b sides saying "hello" and "how are you?" - This happens with some of my friends, even though people are becoming more educated in the last decades.

Religion here tends to be opposed to education, though Catholics like having indoctrination centers ("schools") that they use to both get money and to make sure they get their claws very deep into children.  Catholics have private schools to which one can send one's children for a fee instead of to the free public schools for K-12 (please note that U.S. ideas of "private schools" and "public schools" are quite different from the way those expressions are used in England).

So, here Catholics will tell you that they value an education, but what they mean by that is something different from just what one would get in a secular school.  The usual subjects, though, they probably do well enough.  But religion is a required part of their curriculum.

There are also other religious schools for K-12, or some part thereof.

By law, one must provide an education for one's children, which means either sending them to public school, private school, or homeschooling them (which is teaching them yourself at home, an idea that I think is not generally good).  Most people who homeschool their children seem to be religious fanatics, who want to keep their children from the contamination of the world, but there are exceptions to that generalization.

 

I think american exceptionalism and a sense of entitlement is what hurts america the most and causes many Europeans to hate america -

The idea of American exceptionalism is very much a part of conservatism is the U.S., which is tied in with religion.  See:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_exceptionalism

And with that idea comes a sense of entitlement.  So I don't think this is completely separate from the influence of religion in the U.S.

To put this another way, the people who tend to promote the idea of American exceptionalism and therefore have a sense of entitlement tend to be religious.  (Of course, people who are very rich also tend to have a feeling of entitlement, which is not primarily a matter of religion.)

Irreligious people (like me) tend to view these things with disdain.  The idea that the U.S. is better than everywhere else in every way is, frankly, moronic.

My parents hate the US with a passion I can't describe, though I think what they really hate is America's foreign policy and some parts of the legal system and how the economy works.

Your parents might be interested to know that I do not blame them for that feeling.  Just to be clear, I am an American, and have been my whole life.

There are many things that the U.S. has done that are grossly immoral.  Both in foreign policy, and in domestic policy, though I expect that the former, as you say, is most relevant to how your parents feel.

Unfortunately, my influence on U.S. laws and practices is nearly nothing at all.

Some of the best schools in my country are Catholic - I am going to get a masters' degree in a Catholic university - Rest assured, religious lessons are optional and are mostly about discussing important moral issues within a context of diverse religious beliefs and not just Catholicism - I'm going to pay a big sum of money, but it's worth it - For this reason I don't see religion as ignorant as some people here, otherwise it wouldn't be justified the amount of great schools that are Catholic (and the money you effectively pay to get your kids there, it's not exactly cheap).

In the U.S., religious colleges and universities are typically not as good as secular ones.  However, probably the Catholic schools are better than most religious schools.  But you would probably have to take some religious crap classes here in a Catholic school.

If you were attending school in the U.S., I would recommend avoiding religious schools.  You can look online for lists of the most respected schools in the U.S., and see that my opinion is not dramatically different from those who typically make such rankings.


But I suspect that the greater point you wish to make is that it is possible to be well-educated and be religious.  Of course, that is true, at least in the conventional sense.  Not all education is equal in terms of getting people to think critically, and also people often compartmentalize their ideas so that within a particular subject, someone might be very capable, without being very reasonable in other areas of their thinking.

In the case of Catholicism, they do not want you thinking certain kinds of thoughts, as such thoughts tend to lead to atheism.  So although they may provide a fine education in some subjects, there are certain subjects that I would be very disinclined to trust them (such as Philosophy, for example).  If they taught philosophy properly, they would be pointing out the fact that all of the arguments for the existence of god are generally regarded as fallacious.  I somehow doubt that they are going to be presenting such ideas in a fair, unbiassed way in most Catholic schools.

In other words, for all their pretense at valuing an education, I think the Catholics are not interested in teaching people to think critically and carefully about everything, for if they did, they would be basically teaching their students to reject Catholicism, and I am going to go out on a limb and say that that is not the purpose of Catholic schools.