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

joseduarte.com

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

#291

Post by eveningcoffee »

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…

Edit: Actually you guys are even cooler than that. You're down-voting my old posts, too. I admire your commitment to group-think!

Now this is some discussing imgur, thrumbl kind of behaviour here. Not that it would matter but I counter up voted your submissions and bunch of your comments (just to make you feel better). Funny enough, that is also behaviour from more silly networks.

To be honest, I could not tolerate this brainless group-think behaviour in imgur regardless of all the entertainment there and I really hope that this has no holding here.

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

#292

Post by CM30 »

defen wrote: post #208
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…

> They dislike point blank denial of facts such as that of human-caused climate change perpetuated mostly by conservative think tanks and consumed by an undereducated population of people who legitimately don't know better. The left disregards science when it suits their politics as well, e.g. IQ - https://twitter.com/sapinker/status/645301814955388930 Regarding the opposites-list - just because someone doesn't consi…

Yep. Politics and science do not mix, at least well. Science has no political bias, it has a reality bias that just about everyone will disagree with in some way.

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

#293

Post by nkurz »

midwest1 wrote: post #212
jolux wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Jose Duarte, the author of the post being discussed, has written compellingly on why he feels the Cook article is outright fraud, and that the correct percentage (if there is one) is closer to 80%. Here's an entry point, but you might need to follow the links for context: http://www.joseduarte.com/blog/correction-counting

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

#294

Post by Dr_tldr »

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?

The real question is "would it be wise?" The idea that you can "no platform" your opponents indefinitely without ever engaging their arguments usually ends badly. If one side is opportunistically throwing together every single grievance (both legitimate and imaginary) and the other is totally ignorant of what they're saying and refuses to even talk to them, the side that runs away from discussion grows weaker while the other side grows stronger.

If you want extremist views to have free reign, then keep avoid them until they form a broad enough coalition of the ignored and disaffected to take power, I guess.

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

#295

Post by js8 »

isolate wrote: post #183
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…

> point blank denial of facts such as that of human-caused climate change Science can't prove/disprove AGW because there's no control, which means that it isn't and can't be a fact. (I believe we should assume AGW to be safe.)

> Science can't prove/disprove AGW because there's no control, which means that it isn't and can't be a fact.

This is so wrong... If it was correct, what would be point of doing science? Let's face it - the point of science is to build models of reality. And every model (except of usage of the world in logic) by definition is a type of inductive reasoning about reality. The reason why we want to have models is to be able to predict situations where we don't have control; for instance, we don't want build two bridges that are to be used by people to see which one fails. So you're pretty much rejecting inductive reasoning in that sentence.

The AGW theory, specifically, is not a fact (GW is a fact), it's a model that tells us what's gonna happen (conditionally on our emissions) with the planet. And you can believe it's a good model even without having control (just like you can believe that a computer model of a bridge is a useful tool). For instance, because you understand laws of thermodynamics, and you can measure what greenhouse gas is.

(Oh, on 2nd reading, I understand where you're coming from. Model is technically not a fact, fact is some observation. But I guess in common language, most of the things we call facts are actually models.)

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

#296

Post by zo1 »

tangled_zans wrote: post #279
donatj wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libertarian. Apparently detesting violence is unpopular.

Huh. Well, I'm just going to go out on a limb here and say that it's probably some other aspect of libertarianism that offended them. Just saying. Unless they're actually offended by non-violence, in which case they probably did you a favor.

>"Unless they're actually offended by non-violence, in which case they probably did you a favor."

Most would not say they are offended by non-violence, and most would actually advocate non-violence. The problem comes in when you start pointing out that logical and consistent definitions of violence/aggression preclude a lot of the things people value and think noble. To some, mentioning you are Libertarian inherently means you are saying all of their "noble" and "good" ideas should be scrapped because they rely on aggression. Hence the cliched "you want poor people to starve" criticism of Libertarian-like beliefs.

Violence is also a bit of a misleading word, in that it paints a very physical picture. Threat of violence can be seen as aggression, and is on-par with actual violence because the implication is that if compliance is not achieved, the aggressor will exercise violence. Had to clarify a bit, as I did switch the discussion from violence to aggression, which is what libertarianism and anarcho-capitalism is mainly about.

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

#297

Post by BellsOnSunday »

littletimmy wrote: post #215
BellsOnSunday wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

My point was that there are exceptions to the rule. I don't think the exceptions (scientists with, generally speaking, open minds who pass these habits on to students) are as rare as people reading Kuhn might think. I don't think there is a correlation with doing brilliant work or sparking a paradigm shift, but not everyone is small minded and protective of their territory. Maybe it just seems that way to me because I'm not very ambitious, but I notice quite a few people who don't fit the Kuhnian stereotype.

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

#298

Post by seansmccullough »

pkgekgp wrote: post #267
seansmccullough wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, I'm from Iowa, there are lot's of smart people in Middle America. There are also a lot of condescending people on the Coasts.

On the off-chance that you're not the awful person you sound like: "There are lots of (negative adjective) people (in area)" always reads poorly. Especially if you're from another area that is known for being hostile to people in that area. It makes it seem like you're just another closed-minded jerk perpetuating the hate that your area is famous for. Which you almost certainly are.

My comment was just a response to the stereotype that people from the middle of the country are stupid. Now you're bring up the stereotype that people from the Midwest are closed-minded and hateful. I don't hate anyone, I simply brought up another stereotype.

I think the personal attack was unnecessary.

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

#299

Post by [deleted] »

pkgekgp wrote: post #267
seansmccullough wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, I'm from Iowa, there are lot's of smart people in Middle America. There are also a lot of condescending people on the Coasts.

On the off-chance that you're not the awful person you sound like: "There are lots of (negative adjective) people (in area)" always reads poorly. Especially if you're from another area that is known for being hostile to people in that area. It makes it seem like you're just another closed-minded jerk perpetuating the hate that your area is famous for. Which you almost certainly are.

[deleted]

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

#300

Post by isolate »

js8 wrote: post #295
isolate wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> point blank denial of facts such as that of human-caused climate change Science can't prove/disprove AGW because there's no control, which means that it isn't and can't be a fact. (I believe we should assume AGW to be safe.)

> Science can't prove/disprove AGW because there's no control, which means that it isn't and can't be a fact. This is so wrong... If it was correct, what would be point of doing science? Let's face it - the point of science is to build models of reality. And every model (except of usage of the world in logic) by definition is a type of inductive reasoning about reality. The reason why we want to have models is to be…

I agree with your point of view on just about everything. I was just objecting to the use of the word fact. I make a point of doing this. The AGW believers hate me for calling it a belief, and the AGW deniers hate me for believing in AGW. I must be doing something right!

Your words about models and inductive reasoning are helpful. Bringing that up in the future will probably help clarify my position, which is about like yours. Thanks.

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