“Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future
Chris Mooney's Unscientific America starts out strongly making a solid case against an American educational system that is in jeopardy of falling behind the rest of the world, a public unaware of science and scientists that lack the necessary communications skills to get the message any further than their own small community.
In an earlier book, The Republican War on Science, showed how the GOP distorted, mislead and lied to the American public making scientific knowledge about Global Warming almost useless in the United States while the rest of the world prepares. In addition to the consequences of not keeping up in science, Mooney shows evidence of the disconnect between science and the American public that largely ignores scientific breakthroughs and even rejects scientific principles.
Despite the acceptance of the theory of evolution around the world Unscientific America shows how pseudo science muddies the waters with bogus research such as "creation science."
The book's arguments flow until it comes to religion's role in thwarting science when Mooney suddenly becomes less aggressive, suggesting that the rift between non-believing scientists and religionists is counterproductive. That Mooney tip-toes around the science and religion discussion makes that portion of the book its least effective. After a strong case building on scientists' self-separation, a failed educational system and general ignorance of the American public, Mooney wants to placate religion despite its role in helping create the current problem.
Closing out his section regarding religion and science, Mooney says, "Although we no longer turn to them (religion) for explanations of workings of nature and shouldn't, they have a vast store of knowledge about what it takes to motivate people, create community, and bring about social change." There are hundreds, if not thousands of organizations in the United States that could offer the same services without religion.
Nevertheless, Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future, makes its case and could have done it without including religion, but at least it was pointed out how religion and science don't see eye to eye. Overall, its a highly readable book on a subject we all need to know and do something about.
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drbarbera wrote this review Monday, October 5 2009.
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