Correct.

And I want to elaborate on what I have been perceiving as anti-intellectualism since the pandemic (2020) began. What has changed since the days of burning “witches” at the stake to what we are experiencing today?

The message is the same –> Fear to manipulate, return to law and order.

But the medium has expanded exponentially –> social media and smartphones in the palm of your hand.

There are more uneducated, non-expert people in this world than professionals, academics, and knowlageable veterans with PHDs. This is an irrefutable fact. 

Now, give them all access, a voice, and the power to spread their message at the same time. Let’s not even get into algorithm manipulation and propaganda. This is a basic numerical approach: every day there are fewer people who know about certain topics, but they have more reach and power than those who have dedicated their entire lives to knowledge.

The result? Massive daily misinformation on all kinds of topics, ranging from whether we reached the moon and the earth is flat to denying the advances of modern medicine and believing in the existence of alien civilizations ruling our society behind the curtains. 

At present, the next great frontier is AI, artificial intelligence. Stop using your factory-made biological computer (better known as your “brain or gray matter”) and rely on the answers and results of these systems from various tech companies, each with its own agenda. 

The average human’s knowledge will be reduced to an “AI search” where you acquire what you need at the moment and then instantly discard it. Zero methodology, critical thinking, memorization. Just minimal reasoning to pick up the phone, search the app, and read the 2-4 sentences of digested and summarized information for instant consumption. 

How can you fight against something so convenient and FREE that is at your service 24/7 and will always agree with you (even if you are wrong; this has already been proven by different models). Why go to the trouble of researching, reading, and analyzing before drawing conclusions, when you can simply open the app and get the answer you were looking for (or wanted)? 

Another thing I’ve noticed is the loss of “proven truths” (not to say absolute truths). If something is established and proven, they doubt the methodology, experimentation, and authors of the publication in order to dismiss the findings. Then they use AI of their choice to confirm their bias. 

Absolute statements such as “the sun is harmful” or “humans need water to live healthily” are rejected with responses such as “There was no cancer in the past. It is sunscreen that is harmful. My grandmother never used sunscreen, drank bourbon every day, and lived to be 94.” 

We’re ending up with an ever-growing gap between those who don’t know and educate themselves (the minority) and those who don’t know and choose not to learn or don’t know and think they know (this is the truly dangerous majority, considering the number of tools available to reach the masses).

If we move to the extremes of anti-intellectualism, a trend that I see more and more every day. “We know nothing, everyone lies to us, do you think XYZ will let us have access to real knowledge?” 

Press them a little with incisive questions and they fall back on countless explanations ranging from predestination, aliens, reptilians, demons, clinging to any improbable fantasy so as not to take the time to study documented, proven concepts. 

I might add that many are guilty of naivety and blind optimism. They don’t want to accept that there are intelligent/perverse/deranged humans sharing the earth with us. 

It’s fascinating and terrifying to see how we are spiraling downward as a society.