Denying Science, For Oil

I LIKE QUOTES. Especially the particularly witty or profound kind often issued by peple such as Mark Twain, Abraham Lincoln, Einstein, and so forth. Thomas Jefferson is a great source, and I often encounter wonderful quotes by Jefferson whih are new to me. Yesterday on Facebook I saw one, which, roughly paraphrased, is this: "Priests dread the advance of science like witches dread the approach of daylight." Like all great quotes, its great because it articulates a great, sweeping truth; it applies to just about everybody, clearly points out a msjor characteristic of all religion: religions resist new knowledge which contradicts their basic beliefs. Like many of Jefferson's best quotes, this one was evidently written in a personal letter. Jefferson assumed that the letters he wrote would be lost to history, but were not, much to our benefit. Jefferson loved science, but not religion, which in one letter he referred to as "superstition". The Jefferson quote also applies to us today, as is obvious in the various of the so called "culture wars" raging in the good ole U.S. of A. The Trump administration, even as we speak, has waged and continues to wage a vindictive war against science and education in 'murca, beyond doubt merely because Trump, and conservatives in general, do not like what science and education have to say about the world and reality, as well as Trump and MAGA. The reductions in federal assistance to science and education are drastic, and disastrous. Experts are warning that if these Trump policies are allowed to stand for very long, the United States could lose its current position as a world leader in scientific and technological innovation and development. Thomas Jefferson spent the final years of his life supervising the establishment of the University of Virginia. He said it was the best thing he ever did, better than serving as president or writing the Declaration of Independence. During his first term, Trump, by totally mismanaging the Covid epidemic, was arguably responsible for hundreds of thousands of American deaths. His general denial of and refusal to take action against the deadly virus was perfectly acceptable to his cult followers, who now constitute about thirty percent of the American population, still, amazingly, and who seem as antithetical to scientific reality as their cult icon. To deny climate change, for example, is as delusional as trying to explain nature with primitive religious beliefs rather than modern science. Climate change denial is a manifestation of anti-science bias. The same Americans who wish to insinuate their personal religion into the United States government are perfectly willing to pretend that global warming is a hoax in service to their conservative views, which include allegiance and addiction to a fossil fuel capitalistic economy. One of the inconvenient facts about solar energy is that nobody will be able to use it as leverage in international political, economic, or military warfare. Sunlight is so abundant in nature that it has no value at all. Everybdoy can havea much fo it as anyone could possibly want, for free. That fact must surely frustrate our fossil fuel corporate capitalistic elite billionaire class, who will continue to resist the inevitable clean energy future to achieve their sacred cause; sucking as much personal profit out of the dying planet as possible, no matter how many people die in so doing. We wee preciely who the enemy of humanity is, merely by watching Trump and his governing mafia mob rip apart and suck poor hapless Venezuela bone dry. Our only hope is that science vanquishes the witches.