This line of thinking is far from isolated

In recent years, the United States have been more a source of global instability to problem solving. Include the war in Iraq, the obstruction on the topic of global warming or the violation of international treaties such as the Geneva conventions. Several factors had participated in the destabilizing actions of the United States, one of the main if anti-intellectualism recently illustrated by the growing popularity of Sarah Palin, the Republican candidate for the Vice-Presidency.

By anti-intellectualism, I mean especially aggressive anti-scientific vision, supported by a disregard for those who adhere to science and evidence. The extreme threats induced by climate change, for example, must be assessed in accordance with the dominant scientific standards and developments in climate science. The Intergovernmental Group of experts on the climate change (IPCC), global scientific process that has won a Nobel Prize, has established the standard of scientific rigor in the analysis of the threats of global warming anthropogenic. We need politicians adept at science and critical thinking based on evidence to translate these findings and recommendations into policy and international agreements.

In the United States, the attitude of President Bush has been scientific. The White House has eight years made everything possible to hide the overwhelming scientific consensus that humans are contributing to the warming of the climate. She has tried to prevent the Government scientists to speak honestly to the public. These antiscientifiques approaches have also affected foreign policies. The United States went to war in Iraq based on instinct and religious beliefs of Bush, and not rigorous evidence. Similarly, Sarah Palin has called the war in Iraq of "task from God."

This line of thinking is far from isolated. It is worn by a significant proportion of American society, mostly Republican, rejected or simply ignores the scientific evidence base on climate change, biological evolution, human health and other areas. These voters are generally not pushing the benefits of technologies that result of modern science, but they refuse the evidence and the scientific advice when it comes to public policy.

According to a recent survey by the Pew Foundation, while 58 of Democrats believe that humans contribute to global warming of the climate, only 28 of Republicans believe. Similarly, a 2005 survey shows that 59 of self-declared Republicans rejected any theory of evolution, while 67 of Liberal Democrats accepted a version.

The problem here is not the religion versus science. It has an aggressive fundamentalism which considers that the experts and scientists are the enemy. This kind of extremism can even lead to war, based on the perverse opinion that it is the will of God rather than a failure of the policy and cooperation. Extremists on both sides end up jeopardizing the vast majority of humans who are extremists or fundamentalists opposed to the science.

Difficult to know with certainty what causes the rise of fundamentalism in many parts of the world. What happens to the United States, for example, does not occur in Europe, but it is of course characteristic of certain regions of the Middle East and Central Asia. Fundamentalism seems to emerge at a time of significant changes, when traditional social arrangements are threatened. The rise of the modern American fundamentalism in politics dates back to 1960, and reflects at least partly a backlash from the whites against the growing political and economic strength of non-whites and immigrant minority in American society. The only hope of humanity is that the vicious cycle of extremism and anti-intellectualism can be replaced by a shared global understanding of global challenges on the basis of global scientific processes such as the IPCC.