Say bye bye to those science guys. A recent poll showed a whopping 94% of all active scientists do not identify themselves as republican. What I want to know is: who is this other 6%? Should we hunt them down and confiscate their Bunsen burners? Step away from that particle accelerator slowly, sir.
Can you be a scientist and live in an alternate anti-science reality? I guess you can be a quantum libertarian. Wait, I’m being told they broke from republicans too—and then atomized for freedom. Juan Cole found this science poll, here. Juan Poll?
Sure 6% is low, but it still begs the question, how can any remotely scientific-minded individual relate to today’s conservatism? The cognitive dissonance alone would be like sticking Mitch McConnell and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in a G-Force rotational machine.
…but we should still do that. Please sign the related petition below.
Maybe those few holdouts are just being oppositionally defiant? Or how many just checked the wrong box because they were sexting their hot lab assistants? She texted me with science? Sadly, there are still some smart folks trapped in Fox holes, albeit not many. Once in this alternate reality, we see patterns where none exist, here. It’s like seeing the sailboat in those autostereograms. Stare at Megan Kelly’s legs long enough and you see the sailboat.
Hint of the day: when staring at Megan you will sense the main mast first.
Their propaganda doesn’t seem very convincing to me, but what if you’re only semi-engaged in politics because you’re desperately trying to find an abby normal brain over on the Island of Dr. Moreau? Sometimes scientists are busy people. Maybe they only have Fox News on in the background while they’re reanimating dead flesh.
The new GOP meme has become “I’m not a scientist”, which should be followed by, “But I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.”
“The beauty of the line is that it implicitly concedes that scientists possess real expertise, while simultaneously allowing you to ignore that expertise altogether.”
—Jonathon Chait
It’s a wonderful tactic, not that they really need tactics anymore. Fox News has proven people will believe anything and, what’s even more disturbing, those most delusional wrong in the 21st century feel retractions are passé.
“I’m not a scientist. In fact, none of them will even vote for me.”
—John Q. Republican
When you do corner a republican with things called facts, they will inevitably employ one of these tactics: the reversal, e.g.: why are you anti-Sematic? Or, they will cite that one data point, the outlier, that supports their indefensible position. Or, my favorite, fuzzy logic: e.g., what do we really know about anything these days?
This last one is true. Our media sucks, left and right. In 2014 it’s very hard to glean the truth through these ever-thickening agendas, lobbyists and ideologies. But when those scant tidbits of knowledge do sift down to us, how does the GOP utterly misinterpret them every flippin’ time?! Those few shreds of wisdom that emerge through the 21st century cacophony—what few things we can glean—republicans can’t seem to glean!
[Glean Joe Glean joke omitted by the editor]
YES, we know next to nothing about anything, so how is it possible to know even less than that? Hey, this is a hazy crazy time period so let’s abandon history, science, facts, and statistics in favor of something Fox calls: Whatever the hell the Koch Brothers want me to think.
Great idea! And let’s employ this belief system amidst a time of climate change, mass extinctions, and an ever-looming threat of WWIII. Brilliant! How helpful of you. Yeah, all smart people are dumb and having a high IQ is another vast left wing conspiracy. Makes sense. Have you heard of Occam’s Razor? Of course not!
To ignore the perils of our planet in 2014 for a drill-baby-drill mentality is sociopathic and suicidal. Our super capitalists don’t believe in green energies or global warming and our fundamental religious factions don’t believe in evolution. In fact, they recently attacked the host of Cosmos, Neil deGrasse Tyson, because science keeps contradicting The Bible. They couldn’t attack the theories themselves, so personal attacks would have to suffice. The usual. When Sagan hosted the first Cosmos series, a generation ago, I don’t remember this fundamental backlash. This is another sign of the GOP’s de-evolution.
Evolution…you’re doing it wrong!
“Those creatures who find everyday experience a muddled jumble of events with no predictability, no regularity, are in grave peril. The Universe belongs to those who, at least to some degree, have figured it out.”
—Carl Sagan
So I guess the universe is mine. BOW DOWN BEFORE, ZANO! Meanwhile, with republicans figuring out so little, I guess we should be thankful they’re not beheading us liberals at our town hall meetings.
Or:
This will happen, but unfortunately so will the Rise of Radical Republicanism. Coming soon to a blog post near you.
