Is there some obstacle that stops him from running?
His ego.
Why would an inflated ego be an obstacle to becoming president? Isn't it actually necessary? After all, you have to believe you're more qualified than a hundred million other people.
Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
31–40 of 101 posts
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#32Thank God NDT is never going to be president.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#33I find it amusing that almost every OP in this thread has cited the same quote as proof of NDT's arrogance, and then every response debates whether NDT is arrogant or voters stupid. All of this misses the actual ignorance of NDT's letter. The last half of that sentence is key: As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so…
The trouble is, the Constitution, and the systems it put in place, while a great advance over the systems it replaced, is old, and the factions and interests much of its machinery was intended to foil, have subverted it, and wage-slavery and mass media have nearly finished the job.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#34I find it amusing that almost every OP in this thread has cited the same quote as proof of NDT's arrogance, and then every response debates whether NDT is arrogant or voters stupid. All of this misses the actual ignorance of NDT's letter. The last half of that sentence is key: As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so…
I dunno man, Frederick the Great was pretty great, as was Augustus Caesar. So clearly there are "right leaders". It seems the problem is more about when one gets a good leader, how to keep getting good leaders afterwards when the good one dies or retires. Corporations have solved this pretty well--IBM has lasted longer than many governments, and there are plenty of other examples.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#35"One objective reality is that our government doesn’t work, not because we have dysfunctional politicians, but because we have dysfunctional voters." We have a dysfunctional political system that provides voters with leaders who are compromised. Who then pander, rabble-rouse, and pick narrow issues to speak loudly about to raise money. Who then lose our trust and respect, corrupting the institution. Voters are not to…
> Voters are not too "dysfunctional" or ill-informed to make reasonable decisions. Approval of the US Congress was at %10 in August, the lowest in 38 years. The electorate isn't smiling through the failures of government.
The 10% approval with Congress is only half the story. Those same people will tell you that they're 80-90% satisfied with their own congressional representatives. The reason the electorate is so dissatisfied with Congress as a whole is because they think either things aren't getting done, or they aren't going their way. Both are true.
And yes, voters are ill-informed and unlikely to make reasonable decisions. One needs look no further than Glenn Beck and the conspiracy material he peddled for several years to see how far the news has gotten from reporting actual news. I remember the "cash 4 gold" advertisements being prominent during his show; do you think that informed people were the ones making that business viable enough to advertise like they did?
A media that relies more on data, that provides context and scope; this is what we need to have to get informed voters, but a lot of people aren't smart enough to place value on that when they can get a daily dose of things to rage about and blame for their issues with the world. (I would further argue that people of lower socioeconomic status simply don't have the time or energy to deal with complex information when they're mostly focused on making ends meet, but that's a separate argument).
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#36> As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so they might choose the right leaders in the first place. This reeks of extreme arrogance. A type very common in academia. The presumption that the masses are ignorant, while you, anointed and blessed, are simply brilliant. No. If you get off your high-horse and actually talk…
At the risk of being labelled as negative, I'm going to disagree. The majority of people just don't care. They don't care about politics, about science, about reason or about anything outside of their day to day lives and relationships. That's how it's supposed to be. As it turns out, the average person isn't brilliant, anointed or blessed (this is due to the meaning of the word "average"). Saying that everyone is "b…
If NDT is showing any arrogance, it's in thinking that he has the ability to raise the level of public discourse. He's really smart, but apparently not smart enough to realize that no amount of education can change the basics of human nature.
If this were true, then Jews as a demographic wouldn't have a reputation for being well-educated and literate. What you're talking about is as much cultural as it is inherent, if not moreso. And if it's cultural, then education can change it.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#37> As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so they might choose the right leaders in the first place. This reeks of extreme arrogance. A type very common in academia. The presumption that the masses are ignorant, while you, anointed and blessed, are simply brilliant. No. If you get off your high-horse and actually talk…
Hm... your comment sounded quite strange.
Do you really know we're talking about NDT, right? One of the most hard-working scientists when it comes down to educate people. And you're saying this:
> If you get off your high-horse and actually talk to them, you'll find that they are just as brilliant as you, in their own ways.
That doesn't make any sense to me.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
His ego.
Why would an inflated ego be an obstacle to becoming president? Isn't it actually necessary? After all, you have to believe you're more qualified than a hundred million other people.
>Isn't it actually necessary?
That... actually makes sense.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#39"One objective reality is that our government doesn’t work, not because we have dysfunctional politicians, but because we have dysfunctional voters." We have a dysfunctional political system that provides voters with leaders who are compromised. Who then pander, rabble-rouse, and pick narrow issues to speak loudly about to raise money. Who then lose our trust and respect, corrupting the institution. Voters are not to…
A political system that effectively rules out more than two contenders can't be greatly representative, since it's easy for the two contenders to collude - even unwittingly - and provide no effective choice.
Re: Neil deGrasse Tyson: If I Were President...
#40> As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so they might choose the right leaders in the first place. This reeks of extreme arrogance. A type very common in academia. The presumption that the masses are ignorant, while you, anointed and blessed, are simply brilliant. No. If you get off your high-horse and actually talk…
>The presumption that the masses are ignorant People are mind-bogglingly ignorant, and it is demonstrably so. I don't know how one could even claim otherwise. >If you get off your high-horse and actually talk to them, you'll find that they are just as brilliant as you, in their own ways. These ways obviously don't lend themselves to scientific literacy, knowledge of international politics or human rights, or rational…
All voters are smart in the same tragically mythological way that all babies are beautiful, all soldiers brave, and all teachers competent.