Carl Sagan in 1995 | Yogthos

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Carl Sagan in 1995

Carl Sagan in The Demon-Haunted World back in 1995:

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 slopped 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 knowledgeability to question those in authority; when clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties 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 (not down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentation on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.

Like 8 Aug 2022 at 16:51 | Open on mas.to

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@yogthos Echoing Neil Postman's hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death

9 Aug 2022 at 1:26 | Open on mastodon.pirateparty.be