Cult of Ignorance

“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always 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 democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.” ~Isaac Asimov

“I believe in God the way I believe in quarks. People whose business it is to know about quantum physics or religion tell me they have good reason to believe that quarks and God exist. And they tell me that if I wanted to devote my life to learning what they've learned, I'd find quarks and God just like they did.” 

~Mary Doria Russell, The Sparrow.

There is no crime in questions.

If you fear the answers, you do not understand your own ideologies well enough. If you fear being shaken, you have only zeal, not knowledge. If the very idea of inquiry rattles the bars of your chest like a child dragging a stick against a tiger's cage...your own logic is most likely muddy. Uncertainty creates fear.

After all, if something is fact, what have we to fear?

As I have said before, Truth is rarely represented in the extremes, but rather somewhere in the middle.

Why do people wish so dearly to remain in their own ignorance? Perhaps, for some, it is a simple matter of pride. But then, why the animosity when beliefs are challenged? Why the fear?

I ask again...

...what have we to fear? Science? Philosophy? Cultural norms? Religion?

I invite any stranger to question. Question my God, my ideals, my ambitions. I have nothing to hide and nothing to fear. Science does not unseat my Deity. My Deity does not demean Science.

The reality is, controversial dialogue pursues us whether we wish it to or not.

When we ignore the nagging questions in favor of stubborn pride, we end up much like a harried mother trapped in her own bathroom, staring glassily at the mirror while her toddlers poke their fingers under the door frame.

She knows she has to open the door sometime. She fears the mess and entanglements and inadequacy. Yet, the longer she remains cordoned, the more fitful her little friends become. Absence and ignorance do not resolve tensions - they amplify them.

So we squeak open the door in invitation.

Kindly stamp upon my arguments. I will be upset, perhaps forlorn, for a while. There is a natural grief that comes when one's cozy logical fallacies are taken away. But in time, we merely trade them in for better ones. We may even come back to our original conclusions with, simply, stronger evidence. Isn't that, after all, a greater benevolence?

In short; we have nothing to fear - and everything to gain.