200 million Americans Are Scientifically Illiterate
While global empires leveraged their advanced at the expense of so-called “ignorant savages.”
The good news: America's science literacy rate is up from a pathetic 10 percent in 1988. The bad news: it's still only 28 percent."
The forces of ignorance have squelched science across history, to the present restrictions on federal funding for critical research.
Elites’ exploiting their scientific knowledge for power is also not new. Mayan elites, for instance, used their extraordinary knowledge of mathematics, engineering, and astronomy to build great cities and temples--and sumptuous palaces for themselves--and to awe and control the masses through a religion that included ripping the hearts out of sacrificial victims.
And what might the consequences of this illiteracy and ensuing cultural backwardness be? Nothing less than the destruction of civilization itself...
