The article suggests intellectual activity extends beyond fact-collecting and saying "wow, gee whiz, isn't space incredible? And isn't it great that only dumb p

The article suggests intellectual activity extends beyond fact-collecting and saying "wow, gee whiz, isn't space incredible? And isn't it great that only dumb people believe in God? I'm so much smarter than non-sciencey god-believing peasants who don't even know what nebulae are" It is deeply intellectual, far more so than NDT in fact. In particular note where it eviscerates his attempt to stray beyond physics into history, where his analysis is laughably false. I don't know why but it's often the case that hard scientists, once they are established and respected for doing hard science, feel like they are entitled to go around pretending they can speak intelligently about any other field, no matter how little they understand it. Probably the learned contempt and disdain for the humanities that consumes and drives the culture of many of my fellow STEM folks. The article attacks the rigid inability of these people to shift their thoughts from the strict empiricist/materialist framework (facts are what the world is) as if they had read Wittgenstein's first book but forgot there was a second -- and their inability to be intellectually flexible, which is the reason why inevitably their attempts to dabble in the humanities flop hilariously.