"The planet does not need more successful people"

[antigone382]

38. Then why the need to insult other peoples' comprehension and understanding of science?

Insults, I might add, which are based on distortions or baseless extrapolations of what they actually said? You can get people to ponder things without smugly asserting your own intellectual superiority over them...particularly when such assertions are based on radical distortions of what they actually said.

Newsflash: a lot of people are aware that the universe is a big place that makes humanity seem insignificant by comparison. You aren't revealing anything particularly deep or new to most of us. A lot of those same people, for reasons which have nothing to do with ignorance of science, would also like to avoid seeing much of humanity needlessly suffer if it can be avoided.

And just so you're aware of my scientific credentials: you want to talk about the three different lines of scientific inquiry that point to the universe being 14.6 billion years old? Sure, I can talk to you about that. You want to talk about the process by which carbon, as well as the other elements necessary for life as we understand it, was born out of generations of dying stars, setting the stage for the possibility of life on Earth and other planets? I can talk about that. You want to talk about the incredible astronomical, chemical, and biological processes through which life came to be, resulting for a little while in a species called the human being? I can talk about that.

You want to talk about our greater and greater understanding of the capacity for sentience and complex language among other species on this planet (much less other planets), the negative health impacts of the agricultural revolution on peasants, or the ways in which studies of mitochondrial DNA can be used to trace human migrations, and how those studies dovetail perfectly with analyses of language families as well as physical characteristics? I can talk about that.

Oh yeah, and that whole Eastern religions thing: I'll even discuss with you the origins and cosmology of Buddhism in pre-Asoka India, how it evolved into the Theravada and Mahayana schools as it spread throughout Asia and surrounding areas--and appears to have had significant influence even on ancient Greek philosophy--not to mention the ways in which it is and isn't compatible with a modern understanding of physics at both the astronomic and subatomic level (and for good measure, let's throw in the ways in which astrophysics and nanophysics are stepping closer and closer to being understood in a single, comprehensive, unified field theory). I can gladly talk about any of these things and link you to peer-reviewed studies and other authoritative sources discussing them in depth.

What I won't do is sit back and watch someone smugly deride the rest of us unworthy hoi polloi for our "lack of comprehension" and our ignorance of science for something that is a *subjective judgment* in the first place--and then pretend they aren't insulting people, but are just here to benevolently spread knowledge, if only the rest of us could appreciate it. Congratulations on being enlightened enough to not give a fuck about the fate of human beings--not the human *race* or the human *species,* but the individual human beings: fathers, mothers, and children, who will suffer and die at the individual level if drastic steps are not taken--while posting comfortably on your computer. I'm glad you can be so philosophical about it. But here's a reality check: I know at least as much about science as you, am less smug about it, and have come to a different conclusion. I hope that doesn't disrupt your run-of-the-mill cosmology, but opinions are like assholes, and as I'm sure many are by this point abundantly aware, the internet is full of both.