…[T]here was an extraordinary mental resistance to discovery and invention for at least a hundred years after the scientific revolution had begun. Each new thing made its way into practice against a scepticism that amounted at times to hostility.
– H.G. Wells
Burt, don’t you think resistance to new ideas is part of the human condition? It isn’t just the poorly educated or the intellectually bridled that suffer from it, we all do. Mea culpa.
It is part of the human condition — in my opinion, a regrettable part, like our innate hostility to others who visually appear to be unlike ourselves, or our propensity to seek such differences out. One need not be hostile to a new idea while remaining skeptical about it. Assuming that there are any Burkeans anymore.
I relate to Sir Edmund in that society has to have rules however given what we have seen recently – and under the Bush adminsitration – people will overreach if not restrained. The trick is knowing when it is too far.