God Is Great, Beer is Good, People are Crazy

http://youtu.be/PKpQRjj_WbU

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/americans-big-bang-evolution-ap-poll/

Brian Greene, a very smart physicist that I have read and enjoyed is "highly distressed" that Americans don't really seem to care much about the big bang, evolution or global warming. Brian Greene is VERY smart, but as far as being wise in the ways of humans, I believe that Billy Currington (or at least his songwriter) is WAY ahead.

"It is enormously distressing that science, which is our most powerful means for gaining insight into the world, insight into truth, is so mistrusted by so many people"
Brian Greene, a professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, told CBS News.

 Really Brian? TRUST of science for INSIGHT?

How about a beer with an old guy at a bar or even better a funeral for hopefully an aged family member who you loved and whose time came gently? Maybe falling in love, the birth of a child -- or just the sun going down over the desert as your Gold Wing glides into Roswell!

Science is about MATERIAL -- technical, DATA, information! "Insight"? Science can't tell us a single ultimate "why", and it says NOTHING about any values. It can give us knowledge about atoms and radioactivity, but it gives us ZERO "insight" into using them for watch faces, bombs, energy, or whatever.

 TRUTH? Are you kidding? Sure, 2+2 = 4, and math can be extended to at least appear to be a very good approximation of being AN abstract description language of the universe. Super, but why? For how long? How would we know? What ARE "we"? Why? ...

So smoking "causes cancer". OK, does that mean that you should or should not smoke? Suicide is now the 10th leading cause of death and rising rapidly.  http://www.afsp.org/understanding-suicide/facts-and-figures ... especially if you are 45 and over. Certainly the combination of data, stigma, taxes, etc HAS convinced a lot of people to cut smoking, but that in itself says nothing whatsoever about how happy they are ... before or after. "Science, in its really pure form, is just telling you what the state of the world IS. Not "was", that isn't generally repeatable or testable under CURRENT conditions. Not WILL BE ... that is clearly HYPOTHESIS, and only time may convert it into science.

Willingham said. "The more in-tune with reality your beliefs are, the more you are in a position to make a wise decision." 

Like a "wise decision" to put a bullet through you brain? Would science help you with that? Say that science "proved" that less people were good for the environment, maybe that is a very super "rational decision". "reality". Who is to say? Perhaps science could gather some data on that.

No, Religion is at the top of understanding Truth, Values and Meaning. Philosophy is about the metaphysical interpretation of our state. "Man as Man", and then we bring in science and technology. The engineers. Greene seems to think that Jordy ought to come up to tell Picard how to handle negotiations with the new cosmic entity based on how the plumbing on the Enterprise works.

God is Great, Beer is Good, and People (maybe especially scientists?) are crazy.