This article by Doug Casey at InternationalMan.com is so well written I wanted to talk about it some and make certain some of it at least is preserved on the blockchain. You can find the original article here and a republishing of it on zerohedge.
I recommend reading the above as I will be paraphrasing some things and completely skipping others. I will be adding links to other media that I think enhances or is relevant to what Doug Casey and the International Man are talking about.
He takes some ideas I have thought about and takes them further. It is very insightful, well thought out, and well written. I am going to share only parts of it as I do not want to simply plagiarize and entire piece. Vote on this blog entry accordingly.
I will add my own commentary as I think of anything that I view as worth stating. Thus, this will not be a complete repost and in fact large portions of the original documents will be missing. This is why I made certain to provide you with two links above.
The article is written in an interview style with large questions from International Man and much longer responses from Doug Casey.
(Image Source: moneytreepodcast.com - Doug Casey)
Let Us Begin
It begins with International Man asking Doug how he thinks critical thinking has been impacted by the invention of the internet. They ask him why people seem to be using less critical thinking than in the past.
Doug Casey: Technology is a double-edged sword when it comes to critical thinking. It’s paradoxical that something so associated with knowledge and research is often at odds with wisdom. I think that’s partly because today’s technology offers instant answers—no thought required. You can go to Google, and an answer is at your fingertips. It doesn’t require research or thought—the answer just appears. It subtly obviates the need for contemplation.
Let’s first define what critical thinking is. I’d say it’s the process of questioning the validity of the assumptions and the accuracy of the data for everything. A critical thinker never assumes or takes anything for granted.
The emphasis on that last sentence was by me. It is something that I myself strongly believe. I've tried to convey that in my own writings.
We can’t always be sure what the quality of a googled answer is, but most people assume it’s honest and correct. However, considering the nature of the people who run Google, Wikipedia, and websites of that nature, I prefer to assume that the quality of many answers is low
This is something we were conditioned into doing before they started deciding what they wanted you to see and what they didn't want you to see. This occurred after they had instilled trust and made people begin to use the name of Google as a verb.
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It reminds me of a scene out of the original Rollerball movie from the 1970s with James Caan. Books no longer exist. All knowledge is contained in an all-powerful computer. The scientist in charge of the computer is talking to another character and says, “Yeah, for some reason, we’ve lost the 13th century,” and he kicks the machine. It’s the only source of what used to be in millions of books.
We’re almost in a situation where everything comes from one source—basically Google—rather than researching books, getting answers from a dozen points of view, and thinking critically about their meaning. Sure, Google gives you many references. But how many others have been “cancelled?” How many considered politically incorrect are buried as deep as the 13th century in Rollerball?
The Experts
At this point International Man askes Doug Casey how people have come to put so much trust into the so-called "Experts".
Doug Casey: As the amount and complexity of data grows, it’s natural to want an expert to sort it out for you. But experts are known for knowing a lot about a little, not for having broad, integrated knowledge. People understandably look to them to make decisions for them. That’s foolish. Better that you go to a philosopher than a technician when the time comes to decide on something important. But philosophers are in short supply today, so people listen to celebrities.
(Image Source: humanosphere.org)
(Image Source: thenational.ae)
(Image Source: lab.fm)
A celebrity is someone who’s famous for being well-known. People automatically assume that famous people must know something they don’t. The public doesn’t know much, but they know more about some celebrities than they do about their own friends, neighbors, and relatives. And that engenders trust. People trust a celebrity who endorses something he knows nothing about because they think they know him. It’s another consequence of mass media. The average person is much more likely to accept Google’s, or Wikipedia’s, or some celebrity’s opinion than to research something themselves. Critical thinking is hard work, and questioning authority doesn’t usually make you any friends.
I think this is very true and explains so many of our current problems.
I see it in the newsletter business all the time. Somebody who’s glib and can present well can be transformed into an instant expert, even though he knows very little—as long as he’s good at presenting and gaining people’s confidence. We see that with the talking heads on TV as well. They’re really just actors who don’t know anything, but they’re good-looking, well-promoted, and have a nice social veneer, so people trust them.
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Over 13% of graduates have master’s degrees or PhDs. That doesn’t prove they’re critical thinkers.
Indeed. Often they are not who you want to hire. They have proven they can do what they are told and provide the answer their instructors demanded. Often this was accomplished through memorization before needing to take a test or turn in an assignment.
In most cases, those degrees prove little, other than the recipients think it’s a good idea to spend a lot of time and money for a credential. Credentials should be suspect; critical thinkers don’t assume they’re worth anything. They’re often a camouflage for mediocrity. In today’s world, their main value is to intimidate by making the public assume you know what you’re talking about. They trust the credential, the way they’ve come to trust Google or Wikipedia.
People are comforted to believe that if they don’t know the answer, someone with a degree does. And they should be in charge. I suspect most higher degree holders think they should be in charge, too. It’s a bad tendency across the board.
The Health Experts
At this point the International Man asked Doug Casey what his take was on the so-called "health experts".
(Image Source: politico.com)
Doug Casey: The media and the Establishment have selected a set of credentialed health experts, promoted them, and told the public that they know what they’re talking about. Take Anthony Fauci—he has lots of credentials. Like everyone high up in government agencies, whether or not he was ever a competent scientist, you can be sure he’s a very competent political operator. And apparently quite wealthy, with positions in companies under his purview.
In any event, he’s a life-long government employee. A professional bureaucrat, previously invisible but now elevated from nowhere to near-dictatorial control.
Meanwhile, there are people that have written numerous peer-reviewed papers, done serious lab work, and are currently dealing with patients with boots on the ground whose views are cancelled because they disagree with Czar Fauci.
The average person never hears about them, and when they do, they’re cancelled by the mass media. The perfect example of this is the use of hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin in countering the COVID virus—apart from the fact the supposed pandemic itself is greatly overrated.
(Image Source: imgflip.com)
Anyone who’s “vaccine hesitant” or—God forbid—a COVID denier is painted as anti-science, a conspiracy theorist. My view is that there are legitimate reasons not to take any experimental vaccine. Especially when there’s a possibility the supposed cure is much more dangerous than the disease itself.
I’ve met exactly one person who’s gotten symptomatic COVID. He was sick for two days with the flu and fully recovered. So where are all the dead bodies? The casualties have strictly been very old people, very sick people, or very fat people. Occasional anomalous young, healthy, slim people die from it—assuming it was the actual cause of death—just the way young, healthy people occasionally die from the ordinary flu. So, is it a conspiracy? I don’t know. I’m just confident this era will go down as one of the most stupid and embarrassing in world history.
The Political Ruling Class
International Man asks Doug if the health experts are new members of the political "ruling class".
Doug Casey: Sickness and fear of death get the public’s attention even more than sex and money. And, for what it’s worth, the public has been prepped for decades by loads of sci-fi books and movies featuring a virus wiping out most of humanity. And not without cause. In fact, the chances are overwhelming that biological warfare will be a major element in any future conflict with China.
Telling people that they’re going to get sick and die, endangering their loved ones, is a powerful motivator to get them to do as they’re told. Still, COVID is 90% hysteria. If someone is old, obese, or sick, they might want to isolate themselves, but it’s insane to lock down the whole planet to unsuccessfully safeguard a few people in danger. And, it’s equally insane for everyone to take risky vaccines against a non-threat.
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Where is this headed?
International Man then asks him where he thinks this will lead.
Doug Casey: I’m afraid it’s all leading toward a many-tentacled police state.
The people who run the State have control of the money supply, the economy, the education system, and the media. They’ve gotten control of the medical system. They’re replacing traditional religion, as well, with what amounts to new secular religions; that’s an interesting twist.
Christianity is on its way out. It’s already a dead duck in Europe and is hanging on in the US only among the lower classes. The elite no longer believes in traditional religion. It’s being replaced by updated versions of Marxism, which was always a secular religion, even though it claimed to be “scientific”—like Greenism and Wokeism.
The bad guys—by which I mean the statists and collectivists—have mounted a war on many fronts, and they’re succeeding mightily. They’ll use the Greater Depression to create a genuine police state—a kinder and gentler version of the old USSR, East Germany, but with a higher standard of living and more TV channels.
The ruling class will blame the collapse of the economy on COVID. As the depression drags on, they’ll also blame it on global warming, not their stupid economic policies. COVID and the Global Warming scam are wonderful deus ex machina devices to allow the bad guys to dodge the blame for what’s coming.
Marxism, statism, and collectivism will once more evade the blame for the consequences of their idiotic economic ideas and evil ethical notions. That’s largely because critical thinking has vanished from the West.
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I found this article to be powerful and like I said it put into different words many things I have been thinking about myself. I won't normally approach an article and quote it this heavily unless I think it is of significance.
If you agree with me that this was important please consider visiting one of the original links above and you can read the few things I did not include. If you do choose to vote on this be informed that most of this is quotes and not my work. I added the images, the videos and some of my own commentary.