[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.
Reason Roundup: Kansans Reject Anti-Abortion Ballot Measure—and It’s Not Even Close
Elizabeth Nolan Brown reporting for Reason.com:
Yeah, that’s the kind of crazy thing about the Dobbs decision — the people of our fair nation are overwhelmingly in favor of having access to abortion.
Oh, and this:
And also this:
Plus this:
But, let’s be aware of this:
I think most rational people, whether Freedom-loving or Freedom-limiting in nature, would agree that a 15-week limit is reasonable. But total bans, “heartbeat” bills, requiring doctors to have hospital admitting priviliges, and other irrational restrictions are just not what the vast majority of people want.
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