Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”
Isaac Asimov
The strain of anti-intellectualism among American Latter-day Saints has largely been captured and magnified by Trumpism. Distrust of experts and the highly educated has escalated because the conservative media uses fear, lies, and manufactured outrage to close minds.
Latter-day Saints should know better than to fall for this. The restored Church of Jesus Christ is not anti-intellectual. It is, in fact, quite the opposite. Joseph Smith taught that “knowledge is the power of salvation” (History of the Church 5:403).
It is impossible for a man to be saved in ignorance.
Doctrine and Covenants 131:6
The problem is that our modern tools of communication allow the voices of the ignorant and the biased to be just as loud as the voices of the informed and the impartial. Sadly, a strong case could be made that ignorant voices are now louder than informed voices.
One result of this is that the ignorant, the bigoted, and the dangerous can now easily find each other and band together — often reinforcing each other’s worst instincts.
The Flat Earth
A sobering, if not frightening, illustration of empowered ignorance can be found in the film “Behind the Curve” (available on Netflix and elsewhere). The film is a non-fiction documentary about people who seriously believe the Earth is flat. (This is not a joke).
The filmmakers follow several flat Earth believers through their ordinary lives and routines. Director Daniel J. Clark presents them as normal people who just happen to have an extremely radical view of the world.
The film also includes interviews with several physicists, a psychologist, and even an former astronaut. These scientists, of course, use both logic and scientific data to quickly dismiss the flat Earth theory.
During the film, flat Earth believers conduct TWO scientifically valid experiments to PROVE, once and for all, their idea is correct. The first experiment indicated that the Earth is indeed rotating, and the second experiment demonstrated quite clearly that the Earth’s surface is curved. Incredibly, but perhaps unsurprisingly, the results of these experiments changed the mind of no one.
Closed Minds
What I find interesting, and frustrating, is that people who adopt a conspiracy-based belief, such as the flat Earth, become impervious to any further contradictory information on the subject. They seek only information that confirms their belief. They seek out others who share their mistaken belief and form exclusive, like-minded, self-reinforcing, social groups. They take special delight in, and are proud of themselves for, “seeing the truth” that others cannot see.
This smug, self-congratulatory, sense of oneself having superior knowledge is an example of narcissistic pride. When the “true believers” gather together, they feel vindicated and justified in their sense of personal “enlightenment” and self-importance.
What they don’t understand, what they cannot see, is that they are trapped in a cycle of deliberate, self-reinforcing, self-deception and ignorance. By closing their minds to any and all objective, outside, evidence, they have locked themselves into a form of intellectual bondage from which no further learning or growth is possible.
One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.
Carl Sagan
The idea that one “has found the true knowledge” and doesn’t need to listen to, or consider, any further information, is in direct contradiction to the LDS notion that we should always be seeking “greater light and knowledge.” Anytime one stops learning, one also stops growing toward God.
The claim that “I understand reality and no one else around me does,” is a textbook example of the sin of pride. It is also not a bad definition of insanity.
Sources: Isaac Asimov, “A Cult of Ignorance,” Newsweek, January 21, 1980, p. 19.
“Behind the Curve,” Delta-V Productions, World Premier, April 30, 2018.
Brian Ferguson, “The Purpose and Value of Gospel Study,” A Sacrament Meeting Talk, December 20, 2018.
Carl Sagan, “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark,” Random House, 1995.
Writer’s note: If you get a chance to watch the film “Behind the Curve,” please return to this page and leave a comment. I would love to hear what you think about it.
Brian, do you read the Deseret News? That paper won’t even admit to AGW. Anti-intellectualism is actually pretty official.
AGW?
Anthropogenic Global Warming
When Fawn Brodie’s book No Man Knows My History first came out, my grandmother, a staunch member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, promptly purchased and read the book. She wanted to know the truth, not the rumors behind this biography. While I don’t advocate purposely seeking out anti-Mormon literature for the fun of it, I do recommend studying to know the truth and testing the claims made against academic sources as well as spiritual insight. “Knowledge is power,” as Sir Francis Bacon asserted.
Is the idea that one “has found the true knowledge” really in direct contradiction to LDS teachings, or is it entirely consistent with them? Are we not taught virtually from birth that ours is the “only true church?” Are we not constantly bombarded with encouragement to seek spiritual confirmation of this from the Holy Ghost, which usually gives direction via a “still, small voice” that only we can hear, or perhaps feel? In fact, aren’t we taught that this is the most powerful witness we can receive of the truthfulness of anything (“by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things”), superseding science, or any form of human learning?
I think that is an overly simplistic version of what the Lord expects of us, but there certainly are folks who accuse us of choosing to remain ignorant in the face of mounting evidence challenging official versions of the church’s history.
So , I wonder if LDS flat-earthers, and members of other ignorance-embracing groups, feel like they have employed the same “read, ponder and pray” process we’ve been taught since childhood, and believe they have received a similar confirmation.
Exhibit A: Recently, a woman in my ward informed me that after carefully studying different political movements, she received through prayer a spiritual confirmation that progressivism is pure evil. I suggested to her that some past and present general authorities, including counselors in first presidencies, might find that idea interesting. She remained unfazed, convinced that her view was more valid than, say, Hugh B. Brown’s. How do you reason with someone like that?
Scott, You have precisely identified the key issue. People who firmly believe nonsense may feel like they used the same methods of determining truth as those who acquire testimonies of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ through revelation. This is not an easy problem. The quote I used from Carl Sagan about being “bamboozled” by “a charlatan” might as easily be used by some against Joseph Smith. This is why I said in the blog post, “The idea that one “has found the true knowledge” and doesn’t need to listen to, or consider, any further information, is in direct contradiction to the LDS notion that we should always be seeking “greater light and knowledge.”
At this point in my understanding of this problem, all I can do is advocate for the Saints to stay open-minded, and continue to ask questions. Blind, ignorant, dogmatism is not the path to exaltation. This implies, of course, that as a Progressive Democrat Mormon I, too, need to be open to the possibility of flaws in my thinking. Still, when the Judgement comes, I’m pretty sure Obama will be in a better place than Trump. 🙂
Our prophets and our scriptures urge us to “Seek out of the best books,” not “out of the approved books.” They urge us to seek “whether things are so” rather than “seeking to make a man an offender for a word.” They urge us to seek knowledge “by study and by faith”, not “without study, just faith”, nor “by study and knee-jerk skepticism,” let alone, “without study, relying on the sure guidance of the pointing and mocking of the Great and Spacious.”
Alma 32 makes a clear distinction between a final and static “knowing” and an open-ended faith powered by “cause to believe” that does not bestow perfect knowledge. There is a difference between those who require a God who will offer “compelling evidence” and those who settle for “inviting evidence.” I’ve been seriously wrestling with debates about faith in general and LDS faith in particular for 45 years, and have published 37 essays in various places. I’ve learned things from other scholars that I could have never imagined by myself, and have occasionally found myself making original contributions. For myself, I have learned to give things time, keep my eyes open, and re-examine my assumptions now and then. This as been impressively fruitful, leading me to much inviting evidence that I would have overlooked. The alternative would be to insist on final answers now, to ignore important scholarship, and to never question my own assumptions. I’ve seen that behavior as characterizing several well-known skeptics, and indeed, defining in some cases their path to skepticism.
It also helps to explore outside models like the Perry Scheme for Cognitive and Ethical Growth, which shows me that some behaviors that some people take as paradigmatic for LDS culture are better described as general issues in human development, which will appear anywhere. (I’ve written about this in “Sophic Box and Mantic Vista” at Interpreter.
So it is important to be self-reflective, removing the beams from our own eyes before we can expect to see clearly.