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Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
71–80 of 120 posts
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#72What does it mean to be a "scientist" in the US? Is it strictly a person in academia who is in the pursuit of research grants?
Does it also include private sector researchers and engineers?
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nuclear power and GMO crops have the same issue for liberals like me: when they fail, they fail in catastrophic fashion. We've already had Cherynobol and Monsanto's "Terminator" seeds getting out into the wild. To paraphrase badly, liberals opposed to both are concerned about Black Swan events. Your assessment of the risk and that of those of us who are a bit more "reactionary" are just different, but it doesn't mean…
Chernobyl is ancient history when it comes to nuclear technology. Pretty much all of the problems with catastrophic failure of nuclear power plants have been solved, yet many on the left still oppose it, almost out of tradition, rather than because of any compelling scientific argument.
There's also a distrust of the companies that would run such operations, seeing as the Republican party is often anti-regulation/oversight. A bad combination when it comes to nuclear power, imho.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#74This kind of rhetoric disturbs me. The burden doesn't lie with the scientific community, but rather the republican party. Science is not a movement, it's a set of practices that emphasize observation and empirical analysis to interpret the world around us. Science is there for anybody who wants to open their mind to it to enjoy. I'm sure some republicans have and assuming those numbers are correct, 1 of 3 things happ…
Although it is true that the scientific method cannot be thought of as "political" in any sense, I think it's a big mistake to see science as deriving, almost mechanically from observations. It is done by scientists and in all ages scientists are affected by non-scientific aspects of their societies, i.e. traditions, commonly held beliefs, and politics. Also, not all science is as abstract as, say, mathematics or hun…
"I think it's a big mistake to see science as deriving, almost mechanically from observations [...] scientists are affected by non-scientific aspects of their societies, i.e. traditions, commonly held beliefs, and politics"
It's neither a mistake nor inaccurate. Once you've observed, measured, calculated and concluded, you can involve all form of non-empirical disciplines you want, after all we are morally and emotionally bound beings. One thing we can't do however is hide from the truth the data has spoken. Those are usually very profound paradigm shifts, a crossroad between being comfortable with what was revealed, or choosing to be more at peace with one's oblivion and folkloric truths.
"Some questions, e.g.: should we perform stem cell research on embryos, should we eradicate mosquitoes, should we try to affect human sexual patterns leading to AIDS, etc. are scientific [...] i.e. they cannot be approached by handling equations alone in an objective matter."
If the approach can't be objective then the question isn't scientific. Granted, those are science related questions and have a dose of moral and ethics involved, but that's not what science is about.
Science isn't there to answer what you should or shouldn't do. It's there to provide you with facts on what would happen if you do it. Change your question should we eradicate mosquitoes into what would happen if we eradicate mosquitoes and we can talk science. Lets take out the tools, dust off old books, go in the nature, observe, measure, extrapolate, calculate and conclude. Then based on those conclusions we'll look at each other and our moral fiber will tell us, nah we should probably let the little scoundrel be.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Democratic party has exhibited a ``pro-stupidity'' attitude on the same order of magnitude, just in more subtle ways. Instead of damning stem cell research, the Dems champion Keynesian economics, seek to implement entitlement programs, and push protectionism (``buy local''). Which is more harmful?
We can debate whether Keynesianism is actually stupid elsewhere. Maybe it's the worst possible policy. But stupid or smart Keynesianism is not certainly "pro-stupidity" economics in the sense that's obvious aiming to be smart. It's endorsed by lots of apparently smart economists, it uses coherent mathematical models etc. You might argue that the positions of Glen Beck or George Bush would be smarter to adopt than tho…
Perhaps we've touched on a fundamental difficulty here: maybe good economic policy isn't rooted in consequence or empirical datum, but instead morality.
For example, the proposition of a single-payer healthcare system essentially reduces to the question, ``should my neighbor be able to walk up to my house and demand a percentage of my income at gunpoint to pay for his healthcare expenses?''
Maybe the adoption of such a policy will deliver positive, scientifically-observable results for society-at-large, but (as far as I'm concerned) such a policy isn't moral in the first place and therefore shouldn't be adopted.
Maybe targeting only scientific validity in politics is a very misleading oversimplification.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#76I would claim that there are two factors that lead to the fact that most scientists are Democrats: the overall lean of universities, and the source of funding. First, scientists tend to work in academia. It's well documented that universities are strongly slanted to the left. It seems reasonable to expect that when the left-leaning universities are looking to hire, they will tend to (possibly not intentionally) favor…
In the science of economics the opposite is true. For example, Democratic support of minimum wages and other price controls, and especially their opposition to free trade, fly against the wind of economic science. I don't believe this is true. First, assertions that economics is a science seem...dubious at best. Secondly, actual economic research suggests that negative effects of the minimum wage in practice are quit…
negative effects of the minimum wage in practice are quite small
True, but I don't know of any economist that disputes it. Yet when approached from a political angle, minimum wage is sold as an unalloyed good to help the most disadvantaged. The size of the effect might not be the biggest, but the degree to which it is contradicted in political discourse is extreme.
I have seen no evidence in the last decade that Democrats are particularly opposed to free trade deals per se
Well, Clinton was of course no worse than GWB, and possibly much better. But if you step outside the politicians themselves and look at the citizens, well, I hear a lot of chatter about ideas like "fair trade", which is simply stupid.
In the broader field, which classical Keynesianism was thoroughly discredited by the 70s, I have to admit that more recent refinements aren't so easily discarded (although I do disagree with them). Even so, the Democrats have been trying to pretend that these ideas are all there is, spouting multiplier values as if there's any evidence behind them, and not acknowledging any of the market-based arguments (viz Austrians and Chicagoans) that would explain both the crisis itself, as well as the failure of the government policies. Democrats are to the economic crisis as Republicans are to climate change.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#77In graduate school, I was once tangentially involved in a group conversation regarding whether or not another grad student was a dick. A few things were mentioned, and then one of my coworkers said, "Yeah, and he's a republican". Everyone nodded, the question having been resolved to their satisfaction. I still remember thinking how ugly that sounded. How out of keeping it was with the spirit of inquiry that should guide science.
This wasn't an isolated incident. I've watched political debates with coworkers where I was shocked at the number of emotional outbursts and lack of charity for the other side. I've had a student complain to me that they couldn't stand an otherwise good biology professor because of their snide political comments about conservatives. Do you think that republican student was more or less likely to go into biology as a result of hearing Bush jokes once a week?
I'm one of the 32% that are independent, and grant that the republican party is part of the problem. Having taught evolution, it's completely bizarre to see republican candidates attempting to weasel around questions about its validity every election cycle. It's equally bizarre to listen to my republican parents' evidence-free opinions on climate change and science funding. But the people here who are trying to pretend that science doesn't occur within a social context and that the republicans are 100% responsible for this problem are just as baffling to me.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can debate whether Keynesianism is actually stupid elsewhere. Maybe it's the worst possible policy. But stupid or smart Keynesianism is not certainly "pro-stupidity" economics in the sense that's obvious aiming to be smart. It's endorsed by lots of apparently smart economists, it uses coherent mathematical models etc. You might argue that the positions of Glen Beck or George Bush would be smarter to adopt than tho…
Perhaps we've touched on a fundamental difficulty here: maybe good economic policy isn't rooted in consequence or empirical datum, but instead morality. For example, the proposition of a single-payer healthcare system essentially reduces to the question, ``should my neighbor be able to walk up to my house and demand a percentage of my income at gunpoint to pay for his healthcare expenses?'' Maybe the adoption of such…
Let's not go into healthcare itself. But I think you've touched on another important matter that I tried to introduce elsewhere, but hasn't been caught up yet.
I think that we must be careful to keep science and policy separated. Even if we are to grant that a certain point of science is correct, it does not necessarily lead to acceptance of a point of policy.
For example, it is well known that at the margin, minimum wage laws increase unemployment amongst the least skilled workers. But it doesn't automatically follow that such a policy should not be followed; perhaps with a proper safety net, those bottom-rung folks can be motivated into improving themselves. Likewise (and even more controversially), even if climate change is as serious as some claim, it does not necessarily follow that all efforts must be pursued: it may be that the cost of fixing it exceeds the cost of the expected damage.
It's just too easy to say "we have this problem, thus we must do something". The values that drive our actions are different from the science that allows us to understand the world.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#79I would claim that there are two factors that lead to the fact that most scientists are Democrats: the overall lean of universities, and the source of funding. First, scientists tend to work in academia. It's well documented that universities are strongly slanted to the left. It seems reasonable to expect that when the left-leaning universities are looking to hire, they will tend to (possibly not intentionally) favor…
>It's well documented that universities are strongly slanted to the left I think that this just deflects the question. Why is it that universities are left-leaning? The implication is that knowledge acquisition is co-related with left-leaning politics? I'm not about to go into the implications of such an assertion, lest a political flame-war break out, but I think answering that more general question will explain the…
Basically, because all the lefties (and I mean the real lefties, not the 51st-percentile leftish types) need to wind up somewhere, and they don't much like working in the private sector where they're expected to aim towards (gasp!) profit. So they wind up in society's other nooks and crannies, with the university system being one of the largest.
If you're smart and left-wing you become a professor. If you're moderately smart and left-wing you become a university librarian. If you're dumb and left-wing you wind up working at the DMV.
Incidentally, while science professors can actually be a reasonably ideologically-diverse bunch, I doubt you'll ever find much diversity among university librarians.
Re: Most Scientists in the U.S. Are Democrats. That's a Problem
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Comments like this sadden me. There is a field called political science. There are lots of researchers in that field publishing in journals, attending conferences, writing books, etc. And they've actually come up with some interesting results. In particular: voters do not make voting decisions based primarily on issues. In fact, there's some evidence that the causation often goes the other way. Any model that starts…
voters do not make voting decisions based primarily on issues. In fact, there's some evidence that the causation often goes the other way. Interesting, I'd like to read more about this. Can you point me to something (less than book-length) that would tell me more? (I'm familiar with The Myth of the Rational Voter thing, but it sounds like you're going even a step farther than that)
I can't find any direct links, but I'd suggest Robin Hanson's blog (overcomingbias.com). His hypothesis is that most political/voting activity is done primarily for the purposes of a sense of identity and signalling. He discusses this in a number of posts.
His basic thesis: I have no incentive to vote "correctly", since the odds of my vote affecting the result are nil. Therefore, it costs me almost nothing to vote D solely to show my friends what a caring intellectual I am, or to feel good about myself. My hypothesis is that this is the main reason scientists vote D (the caring/intellectual image).