Do Americans Suffer From an "Allergy to Thought?"

[Roland99]

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/blog/2010/03/do_americans_suffer_from_an_al.html

This week on the JOURNAL, Bill Moyers talked with New York University president John Sexton for a wide-ranging conversation about religion, the role of higher education in a globalizing world, and the troubling disintegration of civil discourse in today's society.

Sexton suggested that America increasingly exhibits what he calls an "allergy to thought" and that universities are the key to restoring nuance to public discourse:

"This is a pattern that I see: an allergy to thought, to complexity nuance - a kind of collapse into an intellectual relativism where opinions become fact... It's a dangerous thing... I think there's a growing hostility to knowledge in this country... Our national progress is being retarded because we have fallen into this discourse by slogan. We have fallen into this relativism where it's a conversation to stop and say, "Well, that's your opinion. my opinion...' Go back to the Athenian idea of political speech - it was a search for good answers. We're so far from that today that it's almost ludicrous for me to bring that up, but I want to remind us... We don't listen well as a society. When we listen, we listen in feedback loops to people who are likely to say what it is we think is right... We're in the process, it seems to me, because of this allergy to complexity and nuance, of devaluing the importance of education... I think universities are the last, best hope for pushing back against this because what we do is complexity and nuance."

I liked one of the comments in particular, here's a portion:

In the first sentence of Common Sense, Thomas Paine wrote, “a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom.” It is not an ‘allergy to thought’ that we suffer. It is blind devotion to custom, which leads to partisanship, prejudice, and intolerance. It was blind devotion to Capitalism, not an ‘allergy to thought,’ that blindsided the Fed, and Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan, during the recent financial crisis.

[saltpoint]

1. Recommended.

[crim son]

2. I would say so, yes,

and while it has become impossible to ignore, affecting as it does every aspect of american society, I remember moving here as a teenager and being astonished by how little curiosity, intellectual or otherwise, was in evidence among my new american peers. My dull peers are now our teachers, healers and policy-makers. Really, the current situation was entirely predictable.

[Roland99]

3. The latest prime example is the Texas School Board decision re: its history textbooks

The right-wingnuts would be ECSTATIC to have a whole generation of brain-dead dittoheads.

[Jim__]

4. I'm not sure I would label it an "allergy to thought," but, I do think we are unwilling ...

... to listen to the other side.

[Demeter]

8. Facts are really obstinate little things

and the opposite side to Fact includes: prejudice, fantasy, denial, superstition, and just not thinking.

So when you want to listen to the other side, what are you listening to?

[Jim__]

14. The quotation from John Sexton is talking about opinion.

... We don't listen well as a society. When we listen, we listen in feedback loops to people who are likely to say what it is we think is right... We're in the process, it seems to me, because of this allergy to complexity and nuance, of devaluing the importance of education ...

Facts can usually be agreed upon. The amazing thing is that people actually believe their opinion to be "fact." So, when you listen to the other side, hopefully you find the germ that everyone agrees on and then use that to reach a consensus for action.

[pscot]

5. Americans are retarded

Teh stupid; it burns.

[Jim__]

6. I find it very disappointing that Peter Berkowitz, a fellow of the Hoover Institution ...

... writing in the Wall Street Journal (linke to from the article cited in the OP) brings up a number of cases of university restrictions of free speech; but all on one-side. He could easily have mentioned the dropping of the appointment of Juan Cole to the faculty of Yale (a move generally inline with the policies of the Hoover Institution) as one of these cases. He didn't. I question his sincerity on this issue.

[Demeter]

7. Thinking Is Not "Cool"

the role models in TV and theaters do not succeed by thinking, studying, researching, or engaging in any kind of intellectual activity.

The politicians do their thinking with their wallets and their greed. They don't give a thought to the people they represent, because they've gone over to the "Dark Side": Corporations. And Corporations Definitely Do NOT Want People to Think!

A Worker who thinks, Unionizes or worse yet, Competes. A Consumer Who Thinks, Boycotts; or at least discriminates when purchasing. A Voter who Thinks doesn't put corporate toadies in office, nor lets criminals get bonuses and walk free..

The days of IBM with the little sign "THINK" over the desk are OVER. We are all supposed to be mindless obedient profit centers for Corporations.

[Roland99]

9. Rather fitting that my daughter is reading Fahrenheit 451 in her English class now.

[Zoeisright]

10. Yes. And American is going to fail because of it.

The dumbing down of America is almost complete, thanks to fucking repukes.

[RainDog]

11. I'd call it an allegiance to ignorance

Americans want to preserve ignorant myths, no matter what the cost to them or their children or the rest of the nation.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

12. it is an allegiance to mediocrity and people who are more than happy to encourage us to remain

mediocre and uninformed

[xocet]

13. An Acquired Problem....

Part of the problem that this society faces is that it states that it values education on some level, yet does not make it possible for all who care about education to attain it. University-level education needs to be made free to those who would study hard: if everyone would be willing to study, then all should be granted a free education. I believe that a reasonable argument for free university education is that no one truly knows who will make progress in any given field. There are too many factors involved in achieving progress to be able to predict who will attain that progress from just looking at a group of students.

Unfortunately, students are turned away from what they would hope to be based on the earlier schools and communities from which they have come. Not all curricula adequately prepare people for university, and not all teachers know their subject material well enough to adequately prepare students for university. Even though the teachers and school boards may try to provide an adequate background for a university education, they often fail. This requirement is simply too difficult, for they likely do not have sufficient perspective on the university-level material to really prepare students for said material. (Other difficulties are laid aside for the moment.) Teachers, generally, do not deserve blame, for I believe that they for the most part do care and do want the best for their students. However, it seems as though the teachers have been given an assignment analogous to having house painters teach the significance of Rembrandt's work. (Note that it even takes college faculty time to get a full grasp of their subject material. Getting a PhD and doing post-doctoral studies are experiences that most high school teachers do not have, so it would be too much to expect them to have a truly deep knowledge of their subject presuming that they teach a single subject.)

These students who would have been successful but for their origins deserve a chance. So far, though, universal single-payer education is as much a pipe dream in this country as is universal single-payer health care.

I think that it is the lack of universal single-payer education that binds education to elitism in this country. I put forth that people who must live their lives purely in response to circumstances over which they have no control discount study and hold it to be an impractical endeavor as it does not immediately put food on the table or pay the rent. This leads to devaluing education as a pursuit. So, to a large extent, by not allowing all who would want education and by not expecting most citizens to be educated well, our society is destroying itself.

[bahrbearian]

16. Right On

[Uncle Joe]

15. I believe this is tied to sensory overload, we advertise and commercialize everything under the sun.

Billboards, radio, television, magazines, the Internet, t-shirts there are people walking around with tattoos and haircuts designed to advertise for a dollar, stadiums and arenas used to be named after it's city, state, or something that reflected the team's spirit, now they're named after corporations pushing their names.

I believe the people can only take so much before they start tuning everything out, for some people the answer is drugs or alcohol, for others it may just be hitting the remote changing the channel or mute button, but you can't get away from the selling dynamic on which our society is based.

I believe this pervasive, instantaneous, in your face everyday sales pitch conditions people to quickly discount messages and information, particularly if the message is at odds with that person's established belief or the information is complex in nature and requiring of sustained focus.

Thanks for the thread, Roland.

[NICO9000]

17. This dumbing-down has been 30 years in the making

Critical thinking has been in short supply here for decades. The Texas textbook story makes me shudder even more. Just what we need: more stupid, mean, religiously insane people who will be all too willing to say "thank you sir, may I have another?"

:mad: