Americans aren’t that keen on the nitty gritty of science any more, and it’s not all that well paid. Plus, has it occured to you that there is practically zero attention paid to science on the network channels or in the mass media? It’s far easier to find a religious program than a science one on US television. (To be honest- you still have lots of great scientists, and I love Mythbusters, so it’s not 100% bad, but you should be worried.)

I am worried. I’m dismayed by the lack of educational (including scientific) programming available on TV, and here in California we have pretty good programming, compared to what I’ve heard about many other states.

It does also worry me that people just don’t seem to be interested in science any more. I think part of the problem is that we’ve gotten so used to instant gratification. We demand complete, immediate answers. Science doesn’t always provide those–but wait, religion does! And so, I think that’s had a lot to do with our country’s increasing apathy toward science.

I am worried–not so much for myself as for what kind of country and society my daughter will have to live in.

I have lived here for 24 years: I am a UK citizen, immigrated legally back in ’82, got my “green card” a few years after. I pay the same taxes everyone else does – the same Fed withholding, FICA, and Medicare, state and local, same 1040 each April. etc. I contribute useful work (I hope) to the economy and my earnings go to all sorts of US companies (well, nowadays that means a good chunk to China, huh?) and I don’t send anything out of the country except Christmas presents to relatives.

Now some posts here suggest I “should” take citizenship. Here are some points about that:

- Although I’m probably here for the duration, sometimes I wonder about retirement to a little cottage in the English – or maybe Welsh – countryside (Gets less affordable each year what with the dollar an’ all, but still). Obviously that is much easier for a UK national. May become a bigger issue if the US slides into a semi-fascist nutty-religious autocracy (though hopefully that will be corrected as the Bush craziness becomes more widely understood).

- The UK passport is actually a European Union passport. So with the US green card and the EU passport, I can live and work, if I need to, in the US, or in any of the countries of the EU with no further ado, no visas, etc. Now, taking US citizenship does not explicitly require you to give up another one – dual, even triple citizenship is becoming much more common – but it works fine the way it is.

- There is one pro and one con to the green card. Pro: you can’t get called for jury duty. For a self-employed hourly-paid person this is significant (and regarding “civic duty”, I am sure there are more than enough US citizens able to fill any slot I might have had). Con: obviously, you can’t vote. I try to make up for that by discussions and writings to promote the good cause (when I can find it).

I just thought of another Pro – the way Iraq is going, I see people my age getting called up and sent there! Wonder if, if I took citizenship, they would track my British Royal Navy service and consider me eligible….no thanks!

Hope this information is helpful. Oh, and on Deutsch – everyone, keep up the pressure! Expose those useless, harmful flacks, because for sure there are plenty more of them!

Actually, that part doesn’t seem unlikely. He’s getting a position as a press release reviewer, not a security clearance. I don’t think NASA even did a background check on me when I was hired (civil servant co-op, some years ago). They did one for me to get access to Mission Control, but that was recently (currently contractor). I wouldn’t be surprised if they took his resume at face value, especially if he was an appointee.

Which is something else I have yet to see fully explained. How exactly was he an appointee? It is said he was appointed by the White House, how exactly does that work? I’d like more details on that aspect, rather than whether anyone at NASA reviewed his resume and fact-checked it.

While I much appreciate your objective opinion as I often post in emotional haste, I would call attention to the following snip from my above post”

Other Christian religions have chosen to call those Biblical accounts myths or “stories” that supposedly have meaning but aren’t literal accounts. I did not intend to imply all believers of religion were threatened by science, but clearly the Evangelical crowd has “issues”.

Who exactly brought that pressure to bear and against whom was the threat leveled?

Martyism

Now I have to explain. You see, her last name is HANSEN, something that escaped my attention when I quoted her. Pauline Hansen was a politician here that was notorious for putting her foot in it so to speak, and would ask to have the obvious explained. I hope nobody thought it was a slur on Dr James HANSEN, the NASA Scientist who was the subject of our petty- minded PR person, Mr Deutsch. I had not noticed the co-incidence of the names. My apologies anyway.

I wonder if we will get a satisfactory explanation.

On a related note, the “Fundamentalist Left who do not believe in God” (PEM) is an oversimplification. You seem to equate the political left with rampant atheism. Even though that is true for communists, the political left is a house with many chambers. More to the point, so is the political right. There are lots of libertarian atheists just as fundamentalist. Do we see here a manifestation of your own prejudices?

For the record, I am an atheist , leftwing, and Dutch (no Danish )

About trying to turn the government into a christian mouth piece. That may be true, but as far as I’m concerened, censored and corrupted science for the sake of ANY political agenda is equally evil.”

??? Did I not spend half my post agreeing with this??? I thought I had.

P. Edward Murray Says:
“Skeptigirl,

Please explain how science discredits the Bible? Are you talking about Genesis? Just how, pray tell….”

So this whole business about Intelligent Design, Creationism, the dating methods are flawed and the Earth is 6,000 years old (and dinosaur fossils are either the work of the devil or dinosaur’s existed at the same time as humans), Noah’s ark and flood (the one that carved out the Grand Canyon) is not an attempt to make the evidence fit the belief?

Biblical accounts, meet the evidence. Sorry you two don’t have a lot in common.

Surely all the work and money the Evangelicals have put into “wedging” themselves into science circles wasn’t because they just had a whim to?

Other Christian religions have chosen to call those Biblical accounts myths or “stories” that supposedly have meaning but aren’t literal accounts. I did not intend to imply all believers of religion were threatened by science, but clearly the Evangelical crowd has “issues”.

P. Edward Murray continued:
“I believe that there are two extremes in this debate, those who are the Fundamentalist Fanatics and those who are the Fundamentalist Left who do not believe in God and who will throw anything available at you if you do.

Both are extreme and in my opinion both have their heads in the sand.”

As an atheist who believes in an evidence based interpretation of the world, I do not consider religious moderates to be in between me and fundamentalists. You can believe anything you want.

**BTW, as a disclosure, I’ve used beskeptical, beskeptigal and skeptigirl on forums for a while and did not intend to log on this blog under different names. It was accidental and I just noticed. Sorry.

The rest of Deutsch’s Gestapo friends are on notice that we’re on to them, and that’s a very good thing. Autocrats don’t work effectively in the daylight.

This doesn’t just apply to government workers. My dad is currently applying for a green card using the “There is no one in the US who can do this job” part of the law. Looks like he will get it too, since there is no one in the US who can do that job:). But anyway, he works for a oil sub-pump manufacturing company, not any government institution.

Please explain how science discredits the Bible? Are you talking about Genesis? Just how, pray tell.

I’ve said it once and I will say it again:

There isn’t any problem with Religion and Science.

Ever hear of the “Pope ‘Scope”?…aka The Vatican Observatory?
Ever hear of the order of The Jesuits, the order devoted to Teaching?

Better do some homework…a fair amount of scientists were Catholic Priests.

I believe that there are two extremes in this debate, those who are the Fundamentalist Fanatics and those who are the Fundamentalist Left who do not believe in God and who will throw anything available at you if you do.

Both are extreme and in my opinion both have their heads in the sand.

Thank you, believe it or not I am Danish too!

Good Luck to you!

So don’t worry too much much about US jobs going to foreigners, because your government is still quite protectionist.

There is a HUGE difference between “foreign national” and immigrant.
An immigrant is a foreign national that decides he wants to become an American citizen usually. I have no problem with anyone who wants to immigrate and does so legally. Today there apparently are lots of companies that go out of their way NOT to hire American citizens even to go to India to seek out candidates for employment when there are lots of Americans who could do the job.

I’m sorry, I did not intend to offend anyone but this current administration does everything it can to make sure that American citizens have a rough time keeping their jobs.

I’m one of those “Outsourced” folks.

Every nation has the right and obligation to employ its own people and any nation that can’t has a severe problem.

George, class of ’74 Texas A&M (ok, it was really Dec. ’74 for the record; I didn’t graduate on time, but I did graduate with most of my class.:))

About trying to turn the government into a christian mouth piece. That may be true, but as far as I’m concerened, censored and corrupted science for the sake of ANY political agenda is equally evil. The soviet union did not need a christian agenda to make a miserable mess of science with very deadly concequences.