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I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

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Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#211

Post by jldugger »

jolux wrote: post #151

"Why would they? There's been lots of noise lately about how conservatives don't respect science or the intellectual sphere. Why would they? They know we're politically biased." This is where it took a turn for me. I'm basically in agreement with everything else, and it's personally eye opening to gain a greater understanding of these kinds of biases, but when you take a few bad apples in the social sciences (literal…

> The problem is really that we live in a culture that does not value education very highly, nor does it enable good forms of it for the majority of our nation. > Pardon me if a few of those don't seem obviously better to more than just liberals than their alternatives. I know a lot of conservatives who would be exceptionally proud to call themselves inventive, sophisticated, deep thinkers with passions in art and literature.

You may think it obviously better, but the question is about "openness to new experiences." I.e., if you think if yourself as an ingenious, deep thinker, but prefer only 'sophisticated art, music and literature' I see someone whose ego won't allow for new experiences.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#212

Post by midwest1 »

jolux wrote: post #152
fleitz wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's fairly well understood that most organizations exist to perpetuate themselves. If GW doesn't exist a whole tonne of organization cease to exist, just as if GW does exist a whole tonne of organizations cease to exist. Oddly, you'll find that organizations opinions on GW align fairly well with their source of funding. GW is a hugely political topic, and in my estimation has little to do with hard science anymore.

You've provided no evidence of anything you've laid out here and you're trying to disprove a theory agreed upon by 99% of scientists with indirect arguments about their source of funding. Why exactly should I believe you? I'd love to hear more about all of these points but find it hard to trust them currently.

I believe the number is somewhat less than 99 percent. If you are referring to the Cook study, the study borders on fraudulent, to be kind. Hard to type using my phone, I have a couple of posts from 70 days or so ago explaining my problem with that study.

No one really knows how big that consensus is, or what the consensus even is. Too much noise in the way.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#213

Post by hguant »

ap22213 wrote: post #198

Well, at least they weren't being politically correct, right? Personally, I look down on people who are members of any political party. I truly try not to be biased, but it's pretty hard not to generalize. People who seek out association with amorphous groups just seem intellectually weak, lazy, or worse. The irony is that I'll probably be down-voted for stating my opinion (the way things are these days). Edit: Actua…

No, you'll be down voted for being pretentious. This is a lazy, "I'm so superior hahaha look at how great I am" comment.

You're being this guy.

http://www.theonion.com/article/area-man-constantly-mentioni...

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#214

Post by FussyZeus »

brohee wrote: post #162
FussyZeus wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's less a generalization of everyone who has a degree being incapable of performing that task (I'd imagine a lot would be able to figure it out, it's not complicated) and more the idea that knowledge which is highly useful such as that is viewed as being "beneath" knowledge such as a thorough understanding of the writings of Socrates. The catch there is that knowing Socrates isn't getting you off the side of the ro…

> the writings of Socrates I see what you did here

I'm glad someone caught it. :)

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#215

Post by littletimmy »

BellsOnSunday wrote: post #135
squozzer wrote: post #29

I offer as a hypothesis the belief that graduate study programs, even in hard sciences such as physics, aren't looking for scholars, but disciples.

Unless you want to put the word some in there your hypothesis/belief is easy to falsify/repudiate.

As a matter of fact, a leading philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn would agree with that. He talks about science progressing by way of paradigm, and graduate programs a way to induct people into a paradigm.

The book is called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Very interesting read.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#216

Post by FussyZeus »

cmurf wrote: post #95
FussyZeus wrote: post #5

As someone who grew up in a strongly red area and with beliefs in that vein, I know EXACTLY the kind of exclusion that the author is talking about to a painful degree. For anyone who wants to experience it, walk into any Reddit discussion and tell everyone you're a devout Christian and watch the pseudo intellectuals exercise their "openness." And yes it's true I'm far from the most religious person there is, and I st…

Me -> 0-18 Kansas. 18-35 Colorado. 35-42 NYC and Aspen. There are friendly people everywhere. There are assholes everywhere. The notion middle America has disdain for culture and intellectual achievement is two parts in conflict: 1. quite a few people in middle America are poorly educated because of their religion and politics, and the political system, permit them to elect ideological morons to school councils, and…

> "Me -> 0-18 Kansas. 18-35 Colorado. 35-42 NYC and Aspen. There are friendly people everywhere. There are assholes everywhere. The notion middle America has disdain for culture and intellectual achievement is two parts in conflict:"

Please point out to me where I said that middle America has no culture and we're all friendly, and that the coasts are nothing but cultured snobs.

While you're doing that, look up the definition of "flyover states" and tell me what it says and why I probably brought it up.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#217

Post by Radim »

dhimes wrote: post #114
dragonwriter wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As such, I have a lot of Christian friends but, it is understandable that some "intellectuals" are hostile to those with strong religious beliefs given that many with similar beliefs deny scientific concepts like evolution, advocate teaching creationism in schools, and deny the existence of global warming. I think the usual word with hostility toward people not because of things they do, but because of things other…

Do you consider being a Christian something you do or is it a trait?

Excellent question, goes straight to the heart of it.

Does a public declaration of strong allegiance to religious views say something actionable about a person or not?

Do people feel that strong religious beliefs are a direct threat to themselves and their loved ones? Or is it just something a person "carries in their head", harmlessly, and acting on the perceived dangers would be bigotry, as dragonwriter says?

Is pre-emptive (verbal) defence against ideologies and memes ever justified?

I submit that the answer is usually determined by economy in the end, not by philosophising. Is it more cost-efficient to do indiscriminate public shaming of certain ideologies, or is it cheaper to defer punishment to a concrete person after having observed concrete damage? Note "damage" can mean different things to different people (money lost, limbs lost, emotional anguish...).

In genetic evolution, the answer turned out to be clearly "discriminate!". Organisms take strong, immediate reactions based on observable surface characteristics of the other party (the phenotype), without performing deep analysis of its particular gene combination or its mutations, or waiting for their concrete manifestation in action.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#218

Post by FussyZeus »

talmand wrote: post #62
fromMars wrote: post #51

I grew up in a red state, too, and as an atheist, I got tired of being told I was going to hell by peers and forced to pray at school events. As such, I have a lot of Christian friends but, it is understandable that some "intellectuals" are hostile to those with strong religious beliefs given that many with similar beliefs deny scientific concepts like evolution, advocate teaching creationism in schools, and deny the…

I'm curious, how exactly were you forced to pray at school events? Regardless, maybe the intellectuals should stop being hostile, have an honest dialogue with such people, and maybe they'll get somewhere.

Obviously you were downvoted for making a point.

My personal intellectual growth was stunted for quite a long time because so much of the opposition were so dismissive and egotistical about things that were discussed. They were obviously right, I was obviously backward and they never felt the need to explain any of it because obviously a dumb, backward redneck would NEVER understand these complex thoughts.

When you engage in a discussion, you can either pursue the enhancement of your ego, or pursue the conversion of the opponent, and you can never do both. The vast majority of people go for the former.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#219

Post by hguant »

woah wrote: post #196
donatj wrote: post #28

I was blocked by a large mass of people with a shared Twitter block list including a number of comedy feeds I used to like to follow, because one of them disliked my political affiliation I had listed on my Twitter page. The person told me as much before blocking me. I've since removed it to prevent future discrimination, but I shouldn't have to and I don't much care for this brave new world.

What if that political view is that you're a nazi and think the holocaust was a good thing? Would it still be wrong for them to block you?

I think assuming the OC is a Nazi goes a bit far...

But to your point - yes of course it's ok to disassociate with someone who is advocating violence or National Socialism, because it can reasonably be inferred that said person isn't rational, or has a twisted sense of morality than makes associating with them damaging to yourself. However, I'm assuming that's not the case here - it had come in vogue in SWJ and intellectual circles to immediately disregard anyone who has an incorrect opinion. Vote republican? You obviously are a terrible human being. Fall in line with the Democrats except you think abortion is wrong? Kill yourself.

Re: I was denied admission to a PhD program because of my perceived political views

#220

Post by Retra »

jacquesm wrote: post #125
merpnderp wrote: post #2

I once sat in on an academic research meeting where the PI of the group stated "If there are any Republicans in the room, leave, you are fired." They felt comfortable enough saying this even though there were obviously people there from outside the group and nothing like that could be kept secret.

So, did you get up and leave out of solidarity with the Republicans? If someone pulled that stunt here I'd be out of there. Politics are people's private business (unless they hold a very visible function, then it becomes relevant again but for folks just doing a job somewhere politics should be a non issue).

>Politics are people's private business

What twisted hoops did you have to jump through to say something like that? "Private politics" is not politics. It makes no sense to say something like that. Politics is explicitly about interacting with other people in a non-private way.

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