Have you noticed the backlash against “experts” lately?
And it’s not just the US, it’s worldwide.
The President said it succinctly during the election, and what he said may be big reason he was elected: “What if I didn’t use experts?”
So where did we go wrong as a country? When did education and experience become a liability?
Answer: When social media became more important than the facts.
It’s when people in general began to think they know better than someone who is called an expert.
In his book, The Death of Experts, professor Tom Nichols points out that there is a growing culture of narcissism which is being fueled by our Twitter society. Like the President, using social media allows someone to interact with people without having to bother with anyone who disagrees with them.
To me, this signals a modern Dark Ages, the demographic, cultural and economic deterioration that occurred in Western Europe during the Middle Ages. People were executed for dissent, libraries destroyed and books burned. Social structures broke down, including those that supported education, artistic production, philosophy and science. Sound familiar?
And the Dark Ages are recent in world history. In India, the cycle of the Yugas is 24,000 years long, and divides into “dark” ages and “light” ages.
According to the Yuga cycle, we are in the lowest point in humanity in millennia. The good news is that things will turn around, at least astronomically speaking. It won’t be a moment too soon.
Image: Huffington Post
