On the occasion of Isaac Asimov’s 101st birthday, I offer some quotes relevant to today’s political and cultural environment.
ON IGNORANCE
A Cult of Ignorance, by Isaac Asimov. Newsweek, January 21, 1980
It’s hard to quarrel with that ancient justification of the free press: “America’s right to know.” It seems almost cruel to ask, ingenuously, ”America’s right to know what, please? Science? Mathematics? Economics? Foreign languages?”
None of those things, of course. In fact, one might well suppose that the popular feeling is that Americans are a lot better off without any of that tripe.
There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that CONTINUE READING: Isaac Asimov, January 2, 1920 | Live Long and Prosper
