Although people live in 2 1 century, their minds remain in the prehistoric stage, reflecting the characteristics of childish, ignorant and paranoid thinking, which is a typical phenomenon of "spiritual atavism". I can't distinguish between desire and reality, fact and emotion, cause and effect and correlation, lack the ability to reflect and question, and I am prone to prejudice. The most terrible and sad thing is that once they believe it, they are particularly persistent. Even in the face of irrefutable facts, they will never admit that their ideas or understandings are wrong. "Stupid illness is difficult to cure" is an important feature of the phenomenon of spiritual atavism. Different from physical atavism, spiritual atavism is not only much more common, but also much more harmful. The public space in modern society is much more than before, and the opportunities for normal people to get along with these "spiritual atavists" are greatly increased. These ignorant people don't know when they will attack. Nowadays, people who are keen to forward all kinds of so-called health tips, spread all kinds of hearsay rumors, and worship the immortal master can be seen everywhere in the circle of friends on the Internet. Compared with the old lady who threw coins into the plane engine, their ignorance is only different in degree, not in essence. This is the most worrying place. As for why there is still the phenomenon of "spiritual atavism" in today's era of scientific prosperity, the article believes that this is an insurmountable weakness of human beings-although science and technology are constantly improving, knowledge cannot be passed on to future generations through genes like physiological characteristics, and every generation must learn from their predecessors and inherit their civilization. Once there is a problem in this link of inheritance (whether the predecessors failed to fulfill the responsibility of education or the descendants failed to fulfill the responsibility of learning), people will return to their ancestors. Therefore, to cure mental ignorance, the responsibility of education is very important. Zhang stressed that it is more important to stimulate and carry forward the rational spirit than to impart specific scientific knowledge. Knowledge is dead, while rational spirit is alive; A knowledgeable person is not necessarily rational, but a rational person can always master some knowledge through learning even if he has not mastered it temporarily. Rational spirit is the fundamental driving force of civilization and progress. Confucius once said, "If you can't convince people, how can you convince ghosts?" "If you don't know life, you won't know death." "The significance of serving the people and staying away from ghosts and gods can be described as clear." "Confucius does not talk about strangeness, strength, chaos and divinity." In the era when witchcraft prevailed more than two thousand years ago, it was remarkable that Confucius could have such a brilliant opinion, which embodied a great rational spirit. Today, China people should inherit this rational spirit, which is the essence of China traditional culture.