From: pksuk@mothra.syr.EDU (Peter K. Suk)
Subject: Re: The Marching Morons (was Re: Cindy the Disco Queen)
Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.science,alt.folklore.science
Organization: The Adhocracy of Enlightened Self-interest
Date: Sat, 19 Dec 92 00:24:32 EST

In article <pete.724415390@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU> 
pete@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU (Peter Alexander Merel) writes:

>kasprj@isaac.its.rpi.edu (Jim Kasprzak) writes:
>Now I run a real danger of offending people by giving examples, but I will say
>that most religions (of course excepting the one true religion, whose identity
>is left as an exercise for the reader) appear to me to be categorisable as
>moron memes.

A subject to be treated with much delicacy, though I agree with you in
the underlying principle.  (NOT what you said.  I am a complete atheist, 
but opinions/world-views are like sphincter muscles, yes?)

>>|> If the educated do not spread their knowledge, and
>>|> plainly they do not for reasons of economic, social and military advantage
>>           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> This is paranoia and I think comes closer to alt.conspiracy than sf.science

In the long run, one benefits most from:

	1) sharing basic knowledge
	2) abandoning the notion of secrets

After all, what good is it to have lots of great technology and no one
to trade with?  Life is with *people*!  And think of how the delusion of
a nuclear "secret" helped start the arms-race spiral.

[deleted]
>work. I am saying that people naturally hoard their skills and data - again,
>no one's fault, just simple capitalism.  

But can anyone really hoard knowledge?  Just because someone knows something
doesn't mean that no one else can.  Of course, people can _try_ but that's
futile in the end.  Hmmm.  I guess _that's_ what you're getting at.

[deleted]
>The result of all this hoarding is that the ignorant masses get more ignorant
>and more massive while the cultured develop their culture behind ever higher
>walls of economic, social and military advantage.

Here, I agree with you entirely.  This is EXACTLY what is happening.  

>>but let's leave it here for now. Do you truly think that there is a conspiracy
>>by all the "educated" to hoard their knowledge? If so, then why do we still 
>>have public schools? 
>
>In case you haven't noticed, the morons appear to be eating them.

No.  We, through an unfortunate concordance of economic and cultural
influences, are creating morons.  The one thing that our primary and
secondary school system does with undeniable success is discourage
learning.  My apologies to any educators out there, but that's what I
have experienced first hand.  That's what I gather from reading
articles and other people's reports.  This is not to pin blame on
anybody -- we gain nothing by appointing scapegoats.  This is just
what is happening.

>>The vast majority of educated people don't see their knowledge as a weapon 
>>to use against the Marching Morons. 

If you're right, THANK GOODNESS.  For heaven's sake, we're talking about
PEOPLE here!  Think of knowledge (combined with patience and maturity)
as a way of helping people up.  Weapons indeed!

>> The real problem is the sorry state of our educational system, which, like
>>many aspects of the US government today, seems to exist more to keep a bunch
>>of bureaucrats employed than to do anything useful. 
>
>Woah Jim, while I agree that the US government is noxious, the morons are
>breeding far faster beneath the considerably less enlightened governments 
>that afflict most of the human race.  

Just a moment, exactly HOW does breeding get correlated with moron-ness
for EVERYONE?  When it comes down to it, not everyone is as free to choose
NOT to reproduce as we are here in the US.  (Don't even MENTION abstinence.)

It's very easy to blame folks, but we've got to walk around in folk's
shoes a bit.  Poverty and social pressure are heavy things to deal
with.

	--Peter Kwangjun Suk




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