From Yesterday's New York Times. I'm not going to post the whole article since it's registration based and may cause problems, but I'll put up a few telling quotes:
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And a controversial one for you:
-Rand
February 14, 2008
Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?
By PATRICIA COHEN
A popular video on YouTube shows Kellie Pickler, the adorable platinum blonde from ?American Idol,? appearing on the Fox game show ?Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?? during celebrity week. Selected from a third-grade geography curriculum, the $25,000 question asked: ?Budapest is the capital of what European country??
Ms. Pickler threw up both hands and looked at the large blackboard perplexed. ?I thought Europe was a country,? she said. Playing it safe, she chose to copy the answer offered by one of the genuine fifth graders: Hungary. ?Hungry?? she said, eyes widening in disbelief. ?That?s a country? I?ve heard of Turkey. But Hungry? I?ve never heard of it.?
Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?
By PATRICIA COHEN
A popular video on YouTube shows Kellie Pickler, the adorable platinum blonde from ?American Idol,? appearing on the Fox game show ?Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?? during celebrity week. Selected from a third-grade geography curriculum, the $25,000 question asked: ?Budapest is the capital of what European country??
Ms. Pickler threw up both hands and looked at the large blackboard perplexed. ?I thought Europe was a country,? she said. Playing it safe, she chose to copy the answer offered by one of the genuine fifth graders: Hungary. ?Hungry?? she said, eyes widening in disbelief. ?That?s a country? I?ve heard of Turkey. But Hungry? I?ve never heard of it.?
Not only are citizens ignorant about essential scientific, civic and cultural knowledge, she said, but they also don?t think it matters.
She pointed to a 2006 National Geographic poll that found nearly half of 18- to 24-year-olds don?t think it is necessary or important to know where countries in the news are located. So more than three years into the Iraq war, only 23 percent of those with some college could locate Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Israel on a map.
She pointed to a 2006 National Geographic poll that found nearly half of 18- to 24-year-olds don?t think it is necessary or important to know where countries in the news are located. So more than three years into the Iraq war, only 23 percent of those with some college could locate Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Israel on a map.
Ms. Jacoby....The author of seven other books, she was a fellow at the library when she first got the idea for this book back in 2001, on 9/11.
Walking home to her Upper East Side apartment, she said, overwhelmed and confused, she stopped at a bar. As she sipped her bloody mary, she quietly listened to two men, neatly dressed in suits. For a second she thought they were going to compare that day?s horrifying attack to the Japanese bombing in 1941 that blew America into World War II:
?This is just like Pearl Harbor,? one of the men said.
The other asked, ?What is Pearl Harbor??
?That was when the Vietnamese dropped bombs in a harbor, and it started the Vietnam War,? the first man replied.
At that moment, Ms. Jacoby said, ?I decided to write this book.?
Walking home to her Upper East Side apartment, she said, overwhelmed and confused, she stopped at a bar. As she sipped her bloody mary, she quietly listened to two men, neatly dressed in suits. For a second she thought they were going to compare that day?s horrifying attack to the Japanese bombing in 1941 that blew America into World War II:
?This is just like Pearl Harbor,? one of the men said.
The other asked, ?What is Pearl Harbor??
?That was when the Vietnamese dropped bombs in a harbor, and it started the Vietnam War,? the first man replied.
At that moment, Ms. Jacoby said, ?I decided to write this book.?
And a controversial one for you:
Ms. Jacoby also blames religious fundamentalism?s antipathy toward science, as she grieves over surveys that show that nearly two-thirds of Americans want creationism to be taught along with evolution.
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