A new dark age?

[Peter Ward]

I was aghast to see one of the Australia's news broadcasters putting a horoscope into their news evening news report. It reminded me of a comment by Carl Sagan, not long before his passing:

“Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking.
I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time—when the United States is a service and information economy;
when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries;
when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues;
when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority;
when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline,
unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness.”

I seriously doubt anybody at Seven West Media will read this post...but horoscopes? Really? If you need a filler, a short piece on
"the sky this week" might inspire young inquiring minds rather than broadcasting horoscope rubbish.

[gaseous]

It's scary how accurate Sagan was.

[Peter Ward]

It's not just the USA. Australia's manufacturing capabilities are already all but lost.... Best I don't get started on that :sadeyes:

[Leo.G]

Mine said I Was going to win the lottery once and I think every Capricorn in Australia won $2.00 each, except me......
Fairytales!
I'd rather read the ant trails, at least I know if it's going to rain.


The loss of manufacturing in Australia is so wrong and sad, most of the major corporations I worked for are no longer in existence in the country and I often wonder what happened to the 1500 odd workers at both TV manufacturing plants I worked for in the 70s and 80s (Rank NEC and National Panasonic, both formerly in Penrith NSW).
Now you have to become an influencer......

[astroron]

When I arrived in Sydney in 1973 I went down AWA factory to
ask for a job, they said they didn't have any as they had made
their last TV about 6 months before I got there.
Ever since then I have watched manufacturing companies closing
down, most with the help of the government of the day.:(

[DarkArts]

I was thinking something similar only yesterday.

My local newsagent is under new management and the range of magazines has not only diminished (that's happening everywhere) but also there was a noticeably higher proportion of "alternative" magazines promoting, essentially, superstitious or conspiracy material. All the science magazines had gone.

The battle between knowledge and ignorance is never-ending.

[Leo.G]

I don't remember where AWA were, Rank and National were both in Penrith where I grew up.Rank bought HMV/Healy out in around 79 from memory and we did production runs of x amount of sets before switching over to the full Rank chassis in the HMV, chassis, tubes, I think the original cabinet design was the only thing they kept. I went from Rank to National and was in a high paid position there till I left to move.
I'm sorry, I know AWA but don't recall when they shut down, I don't remember them still being a competitor while I was at Rank and I started there in 77 from memory.
But yes, manufacturing got closed down with government agendas to move manufacturing to third world nations to give them a means of surviving while cutting the throats of their own constituents.
It cut labour costs and increased profits for the manufacturers but didn't help our much smaller population in the day.

[Drac0]

They have short memories - not one 'astrologist' or anyone else managed to see Covid-19 coming & the effects it would have world wide. The lamest excuse I saw was that the horoscopes were done "months in advance". Errr, isn't that the point of them, being able to "predict the future" based on the positions of the stars? Did they need to know about it before being able to make these "predictions"?

It has been sad seeing this crap returning to the "news" recently. Like you Peter, I would prefer to see something a lot more scientific instead.

Cheers,
Mark

[Leo.G]

My crystal ball accurately predicted cold winters.
Wait, they accidentally sent me a snow globe by mistake.
I know people who base their entire days, weeks and lives around their astrology. Even worse I have a younger sister who pays a psychic and bases much of her life on what a psychic says. To make it even worse her psychic lives in America and she does it online. My sister lives in Queensland.
There is no telling these people.
I think 3 body problem (TV show) sums it up nicely where they use the I CHING to predict when the bad periods will be around. It doesn't work in that show either.

[wavelandscott]

The trend away from facts and science (especially in the USA) is concerning and while we are not completely there yet, we have moved farther down that path and faster than I could have imagined…

At least we had a good run…

[big-blue]

A couple of anecdotes from my career based in and around Adelaide :

When I started my career in the late 70's, the city square had a vibrant small industrial base actually making stuff. Need a spring re-tempered? Sure, bring it in.... Southcotts (thankyou) is still going, but now the major industry in in the city square is making cappucinos and lattes.

Later in my career, during the privatisation of ETSA, senior management took away our New Scientist subscription to be replaced by the Fin Review instead, to bring us up to speed on the 'new imperatives'. Fast forward to the Asian Financial crisis that suddenly erupted. The Fin review had half its latest issue (pages & pages) devoted to analysing this new development. So I bent down to the pile of Fin Reviews under the reading desk, and looked through the issues of the previous week.... no sign of it coming ! No predictive value at all ! I could have been equally well informed consulting the horrorscope instead, and : I would have wasted less time !

cheers
Gerry/ Gerhard

[doug mc]

I'm now in my early 70s, when I was in the sixth grade ,I got a job as a paper boy. If my memory serves me correctly, the papers and life magazines had there own horoscopes back then. Nothing new here. But finding it on TV would have been difficult. The channel 7 news addition of a horoscope got a through caning on Media Watch on the ABC last week. If we are all perceiving a rise in psychosis, in the world lately, it was predicted over a decade ago by a professor in that field of study. He wrote a book about waves of mental illnesses that seemed to him started in his home country of the USA. The first wave was depression, last century, followed by anorexia ( that impacted Japanese girls the most). He then predicted psychosis was next. He likened it to a form of soft diplomacy. Welcome to the Post Modern World.

[Crater101]

:rofl:


Many years ago I ead a science fiction novel by Robery Heinlein, called Friday. Published in 1982, one of the characters makes the point...
"...we must now prepare the monasteries for the coming dark age. Electronic records are too fragile; we must again have books, of stable inks and resistant paper."

In the same novel, the same character said,
“When I was younger, I thought I could change this world. Now I no longer think so but for emotional reasons I must keep on fighting a holding action.”

I've always remembered these quotes, but if you want to be really scared about the way we're heading read Sagan's The Demon Haunted World: Science as a candle in the dark. The rise and acceptance of psudoscience like astrology has me scratching my head.

[OzEclipse]

Channel Seven did a test run of the "horror-scopes" on the news in QLD last year. They must have got a good response.

Ahhh QLD....:rofl:

[strongmanmike]

I had a horror scope too once, so I sold it and bought one with good optics :P

Mike

[JeniSkunk]

It's a return to form, from the dark ages, and not something new, for Channel Seven here in QLD.
During the Sir Joh Era, and for a time after, Channel Seven here in Brisbane would run Astrology With Kisha, in the 10:55am timeslot, Monday to Friday.

[Peter Ward]

As mentioned by Doug...ABC's media watch gave 7 some well deserved stick on this
Link is here (https://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/episodes/ep-03/104947810) (scroll to the 13.20 minute mark)

[pmrid]

I detest that expression. The people who describe themselves as such are empty vessels exceeded only by those they purport to influence.

[Leo.G]

Sorry, it was meant to be facetious, we used to call them the unemployable but SOMEHOW now these idiots get brainless followers and make bucket loads of money they really don't have the brains to earn (I wasn't smart enough to become a fry cook at McDonald's, I could have made a fortune. Haha Haha).