On Tue, 9 Aug 2011 04:04:05 +0100, "Androcles"
education,
which empowers people to tell good science from Savard's bigotry.
It's true that it will take a *lot* of education for people to be able
to tell good science from bad for themselves in all cases... rather than
having to do it in just a few sample instances, and then rely on
"bigotry", that is, trusting in the official scientists who have
positions in the big Universities, and mistrusting the outsiders who
venture to disagree with them.
What is it that makes some people, who aren't scientists themselves,
accept what I call real science, and reject what I call pseudo-science?
Is it reason and logic? Is it that they see the results of technology,
for example, as proof that "official science" must have something on the
ball?
Is it that engineers are at least under-represented in the ranks of
pseudo-scientists? (There's at least one competent electrical engineer
who is a Creationist, IIRC.)
Is it that they would expect more whistleblowers - more of a connection
between "unofficial" and "official" science - instead of
pseudo-scientists usually coming from the ranks of people with very
little applicable formal education? (IIRC, Velikovsky had a college
degree - but in the arts, not the sciences.)
Or is it just bigotry? Is it that they are afraid to appear ignorant and
uneducated? Is it just social pressure, for example, that leads many
people to prefer Darwin to the Bible... and not a real understanding of
the matter?
Instead of teaching a little calculus as an option in Grade 12, are we
going to have to start teaching it in, say, Grade 7... *and* if we did
that (differential equations in grade 8, anyone?) exactly how many kids
that age could actually pass the course? And is that what it would take
to create a public that really could tell good science from bad?
John Savard
http://www.quadibloc.com/index.html