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'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

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Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#221

Post by mayniac »

barry-cotter wrote: post #149
n4r9 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That Noah Carl one is interesting, hadn't heard about that. The Cambridge college actually conducted a formal investigation with a panel led by a Professor, and published a statement [0] explaining their decision to retract the fellowship. The reasons cited were lack of research ethics and integrity in Carl's work, poor scholarship, and the risk of the college being used as a platform to promote racist views. Frankly…

Yeah, if you get to pick the committee you can get them to report whatever you want, whether you explicitly instruct them as to what to find or not. Read his work for yourself and come to your own conclusions. His research gate profile. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Noah_Carl His website. https://supportnoahcarl.com/ > Since I was fired, over 600 academics have signed a petition supporting me , and several lea…

> Since I was fired, over 600 academics have signed a petition supporting me

He initially got fired because (almost) 600 academics signed an open letter casting doubt on his work, on top of 800 students [0].

Also, I don't really think that "read his work for yourself" is a valid argument. For one, you're talking hours, if not days or weeks of research, which isn't reasonable. And secondly, unless the person you're responding to knows sociology well, they're probably not going to be a good judge of his work.

[0] https://medium.com/@racescienceopenletter/open-letter-no-to-...

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#222

Post by charlesu »

barry-cotter wrote: post #94
alasdair_ wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm not suggesting choosing between left and right, only pointing out that the bias is pervasive and undeniable. Can you point to specific examples of this where the science is actually robust and well documented but has somehow been blocked from being published or otherwise stopped due to this pervasive bias?

You’re asking people to prove a negative, and also assuming that there’s no chilling effect as people learn that certain topics are not a good idea if you want a career. The premier example of robust, well documented science with vociferous opposition has to be intelligence. Besides scholars with a fiercer attachment to their politics than the truth like Gould you also have introductory psychology textbooks that go o…

An introductory psychology book that didn't give alternatives to g wouldn't be a very good textbook. g is easy to replicate but it doesn't really explain anything. It literally just proves that there's a correlation between cognitive tasks. That answers a what but not a why.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#223

Post by toomim »

MaysonL wrote: post #170
beaner wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This guy's Twitter thread doesn't seem like a great defense, because he doesn't make any specific scientific claims. It's all just ad-hominem that this org are "climate deniers." More troubling is his claim that they are "weaponizing" reproducibility against climate change. Doesn't that raise a red flag? If you're worried that reproducibility poses a problem for something, doesn't that mean you might just a little bi…

Why are they calling themselves NAS? No reason suggests itself except deception. Name another?

Because they are part of the National Association of Scholars. It was founded in 1987.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#224

Post by stenl »

neekleer wrote: post #210

One problem is that tenure and standing for established scientists no longer afford any of the expected protections. James Watson was not discredited but promptly fired and "disgraced" for stating a well-supported scientific finding in abrupt layman's terms for an interview. The minds of cancel culture would probably say they gave this dinosaur enough chances to fade away, but he wouldn't. If they do want scientists…

James Watson - who was as close to royalty as you can get in science - worked very long and hard to get himself fired. It wasn’t just ”an interview”, but a lifetime of racism and sexism. Lior Pachter has a handy collection of quotes with links to sources: https://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2018/05/18/james-watson-in...

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#225

Post by [deleted] »

scythe wrote: post #10
alevskaya wrote: post #4

Some relevant context here contesting this view: https://twitter.com/lteytelman/status/1216770668475252738

Key quotes: >The @NASorg [National Association of Scholars] sounds like the National Academy of Science, but it's not. >The conference they are organizing has 21 speakers. Of them, 7 are hard core climate change deniers and 0 are climate experts. Sounds like a pretty shady group to me.

[deleted]

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#226

Post by toomim »

scythe wrote: post #22
sandoooo wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since twitter is horrible on mobile, here's a summary: # Nasorg sounds like NAS and could be mistaken for it. # Nasorg is conservative and have published material with conservative slant. # 7 out of 21 speakers are climate denialists. # Therefore it is righteous to deplatform them.

># Therefore it is righteous to deplatform them. It's not "deplatforming" when your objection to someone speaking is about what they're saying. An organization pushing climate change denial should not be treated as credible because climate denial is not science . Anyone who has even the faintest experience with physicists -- anyone who has sat in a room full of them -- knows that there are thousands upon thousands of…

> It's not "deplatforming" when your objection to someone speaking is about what they're saying.

The speakers aren't talking about climate denial. They are talking reproducibility in science.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#227

Post by rfdbsd »

frogger23127 wrote: post #217
rfdbsd wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of his racist, sexist and homophobic comments are conclusions drawn from his work. He is just a foul and bitter man whose terrible personal views are sadly and foolishly taken seriously, due to his prestige and authority. YOU tell me how any of these bold and outlandish claims are actually based on sound research and logic.

No, you should tell us how they are not based on sound research and logic. Of course, some of what he says may just be his personal opinions. You say that he is a foul and bitter man with terrible personal views, but that is your own opinion and not objectively true.

> No, you should tell us how they are not based on sound research and logic.

Your claim is simply a just-so statement. You're the one making an unjustified assumption. Why should I assume you're correct by default? Until you actually provide any plausible reason why I should take it seriously, your claim is invalid.

The impetus is on _you_.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#228

Post by barry-cotter »

charlesu wrote: post #222
barry-cotter wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re asking people to prove a negative, and also assuming that there’s no chilling effect as people learn that certain topics are not a good idea if you want a career. The premier example of robust, well documented science with vociferous opposition has to be intelligence. Besides scholars with a fiercer attachment to their politics than the truth like Gould you also have introductory psychology textbooks that go o…

An introductory psychology book that didn't give alternatives to g wouldn't be a very good textbook. g is easy to replicate but it doesn't really explain anything. It literally just proves that there's a correlation between cognitive tasks. That answers a what but not a why.

I would agree if the alternatives were held to the same standards. As is teaching Sternberg or Gardner’s theories alongside g is like teaching Lamarck alongside Darwin.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#229

Post by frogger23127 »

rfdbsd wrote: post #227
frogger23127 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you should tell us how they are not based on sound research and logic. Of course, some of what he says may just be his personal opinions. You say that he is a foul and bitter man with terrible personal views, but that is your own opinion and not objectively true.

> No, you should tell us how they are not based on sound research and logic. Your claim is simply a just-so statement. You're the one making an unjustified assumption. Why should I assume you're correct by default? Until you actually provide any plausible reason why I should take it seriously, your claim is invalid. The impetus is on _you_.

Here's some research

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_Global_Inequality

Of course there's a lot of emotional hysterical screeching accusations of "racism" toward this research, but those aren't valid refutations.

Re: 'Cancel Culture' Comes to Science?

#230

Post by fsh »

toomim wrote: post #223
MaysonL wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are they calling themselves NAS? No reason suggests itself except deception. Name another?

Because they are part of the National Association of Scholars. It was founded in 1987.

The "real" NAS (National Academy of Sciences) was founded in 1863. Their choice of name is certainly suspicious.
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