Anti-Intellectualism as a Social Problem in America

Introduction: Anti-Science in Historical Context

Anti-science is nothing new and has, in fact, been seamlessly woven into the story of human progress. Locating historical incidents linked to the repercussions of anti-intellectualism or anti-science is easy. One of the first European examples of such repercussions is the story of Socrates's death sentence, handed down because his philosophy of reason contradicted the established religious authorities in ancient Athens. Anti-intellectualism permeates European history, culminating with the excommunication of prominent scientists like Galileo and Kepler. Science, truth, and intellectual inquiry can present clear threats to an established authority like the Catholic Church or any other religious body, as well as threatening powerful political authorities or social systems like patriarchy. Any social system that relies on propaganda and myth-making to preserve its integrity is naturally going to be threatened by science and critical inquiry.

On the surface, there is a sort of quaintness about anti-intellectualism that appeals to populist or religious sentiments. However, beneath any stated desire to shun perceived elitism or to preserve cultural and religious tradition lies a definite social problem. Anti-intellectualism and anti-science threaten to undermine the very foundations of democracy and human rights.

Is Anti-Science and Anti-Intellectualism a Social Problem?

The consequences of anti-intellectualism are potentially dire, with both short-term and long-term implications. One of the most obvious and immediate problems with anti-science is the way it "undermines public and private support for science both financially and through a reduction in the number of future scientists willing to offer new ideas and innovations" (Gauchat, 2012, p. 338). This is clearly a problem given the pressing need for technological innovations in medicine to promote disease eradication, in engineering to improve public infrastructure in sustainable and cost-effective ways, and in the energy sector to mitigate climate change. Undermining the importance of science is dangerous because it essentially means suppressing human knowledge and information for no apparent cause other than to bolster the power of religion and non-intellectual authorities. Scientists like Galileo and intellectuals like Socrates were scorned precisely because they questioned the relevance and implications of unchecked religious authority.

If fears of overreaching religious authority are not sufficient cause for concern, there are also serious economic repercussions of anti-intellectualism and anti-science. The United States ranks below almost every other industrialized, wealthy nation in the world in terms of basic educational performance in core subjects including math, science, and literacy. A Pew Research report based on data from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) found that the United States ranks 38th overall among the 71 countries surveyed (Desilver, 2017). The "dumbing down" of America is not just a cliché; it is really happening. With an underperforming populace that is in some cases outright proud of its anti-intellectualism, the American economy is bound to suffer eventually due to the inability of future generations to compete with far more educated and competent individuals from countries around the world. If Americans become habituated to mistrusting academia and science, public policy would be even less based on evidence, fact, and research than it already is — which is the real reason why anti-intellectualism is a social problem.

The United States boasts most of the top universities and research institutes in the world, and yet anti-intellectualism has undermined American education in general and has led to the nation ranking lower and lower on actual test scores. The World Economic Forum ranked the U.S. 52nd among 139 nations in the quality of its university math and science instruction; the nation is 12th in the world for college degree attainment; and "nearly 50% of all graduate students in the sciences in the U.S. are foreigners, most of whom are returning to their home countries" (Williams, 2014, p. 1). Americans are willing to profit from academia by soliciting foreign students but are unwilling to invest in their own intellectual development.

Anti-intellectualism and anti-science lead to poor decision-making based not on fact or evidence but on opinion, mistruth, or "alternative facts." According to Williams (2014), only 28% of high school science teachers consistently follow the National Research Council guidelines on teaching evolution, and 13% of those teachers explicitly advocate creationism or "intelligent design." Without a basic grasp of knowledge in history, science, math, and other core subjects, Americans cannot create the types of public policies that reflect the best interests of the nation and its citizens. Decisions related to all matters of public policy and social welfare need to be based on evidence, facts, and truth — not on whim, public opinion, or propaganda.

Niose (2015) links anti-intellectualism with hyper-patriotism, arguing that false beliefs in American exceptionalism, rooted in the myth of American superiority and hyper-patriotic propaganda, have led Americans to be complacent at best and self-destructive at worst. "Many Americans seem to honestly believe that their country both invented and perfected the idea of freedom, that the quality of life here far surpasses everywhere else in the world. But it doesn't," because the quality of life rankings for America are not even in the top ten (Niose, 2015, p. 1). America ranks sixteenth, largely because of crime and incarceration rates, rates of teen pregnancy, literacy levels, and several other measures (Niose, 2015, p. 1). Teen pregnancy appears on this list in part because anti-science creates a religious or ideological backlash against teaching basic sex education in classrooms, with serious long-term consequences for young people who are driven away from school to care for an unplanned child.

Consequences of anti-intellectualism are also being measured in the domain of ethics. One consequence noted in the literature is a breakdown of ethical reasoning, for which intellectual thought is essential. Ethics are not rooted in religion, contrary to popular belief, but in rational thought — which is precisely why Socrates sought to win over the Athenian council with his argument for reason. In a survey of 666 business students at three different American universities, Elias (2009) found that students who scored high on anti-intellectualism measures were less likely to perceive college cheating as unethical than their counterparts who valued science. Niose (2015) also links anti-intellectualism to both racism and gun violence. Although Niose (2015) does not base this correlation on empirical evidence, it is relatively easy to see how intellectual inquiry would expose the irrationality of racism as well as the irrationality of gun proliferation.

Climate change denial and the anti-vaccination and anti-GMO movements are among the more serious and measurable social problems directly linked to anti-science and anti-intellectualism. With a culture of anti-science, major public policy decisions driven by an anti-science administration will have damaging consequences for subsequent generations of Americans and for the rest of the world. Raphael (2016) argues that anti-intellectualism in America created the conditions for the Donald Trump presidency. "Trump's disdain for knowledge . . . is dangerous," but it is also based on pandering to a constituency with a "long tradition of hostility towards knowledge" (Raphael, 2016). Similarly, anti-science is a social problem because it has direct implications for public health. Anti-vaccination sentiments have led to disease proliferation (Seth, 2015). The anti-science movement could also impede development of new technologies aimed at reducing crop failures and malnutrition worldwide, as the anti-GMO movement flourishes in spite of the fact that there is no evidence or reason to believe that "altering genes precisely in a lab is more dangerous than altering them wholesale through traditional breeding" (Achenbach, 2015). Unfortunately, Americans have trouble distinguishing between real and manufactured hazards, in large part because anti-intellectualism is supported at high levels of government.

References

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