471–480 of 1001 posts
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" I really do not understand how trans debate has come to dominate some online discourse." It is a wedge issue, simply. It benefits entrenched interests because it allows them to anger and control people, just like they do with the War on Christmas, the War on Guns, Welfare Queens, Baby Killers, Wokeism, DEI, and so many other catchphrases that collapse nuanced issues to a sports slogan. This entire discussion is gro…
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The issue isn’t that Scientific American leans “pro-Democrat” and it is political. It always has, and that’s understandable. The real problem is that the modern Democratic Party increasingly aligns with postmodernism, which is inherently anti-science (Postmodernism challenges the objectivity and universality of scientific knowledge, framing it as a social construct shaped by culture, power, and historical context, ra…
We have such low standards for republicans, it's amazing. We complain that democrats are increasingly acknowleding that science is done by humans and humans will tend to ask questions based on what phenomena they've encountered and what explanations they've been given in their lives up til then, but totally give the republicans a pass on catering to groups that deny global warming, evolution or even that the world is…
Criticizing Democrats doesn't necessarily mean one likes Republicans. The two poles of the idiosyncratic US political system aren't the only ideologies or worldviews that exist.
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Yes, a portion of Democratic Party leadership has appeared to move away from science and reason in some cases. One example that frustrated me as a taxpayer and parent with kids in school: here in California, it was Democratic policymakers who removed Algebra from high school curricula, arguing that it would help address disparities among minority students.
Don't worry, you won't have to worry about what they teach your children in school anymore - Republicans are going to destroy the department of education.
These problems are not a simple matter of funding. One need only at California's High Speed Rail project. Costs have soared from early estimates of $15B to now more than $130B+, despite almost no track being laid over the last 15 years. This is in a one party state with complete Democrat control, so you can't blame Republicans.
Bureaucratic mismanagement and inefficiency are the overwhelming problems now.
To the "everything is political" crowd: The complaint is not that SciAm writes about politics. It's that they write SCIENTIFIC NONSENSE when arguing for political causes. Exhibit A: "the so-called normal distribution of statistics assumes that there are default humans who serve as the standard that the rest of us can be accurately measured against."
Hilarious! The while message of the article is to trash talk the departing editor accusing her of political left bias... which in it self (the trash talking) is a political statement from the conservative side. To the author of the article: you are no better than her...
Did you know that [...] the normal distribution—a vital and basic statistical concept—is inherently suspect? [...] That author also explained that "the so-called normal distribution of statistics assumes that there are default humans who serve as the standard that the rest of us can be accurately measured against." But the normal distribution doesn't make any such value judgments, and only someone lacking in basic ed…
People double down as part of human psychology. Some grasp their own biases much better than others. We should try to train people to be more self reflective and less biased politically. It does not correlate with education level so something is clearly broken in higher ed..
Yikes, quite the scathing article and example of a the politicization of science. “Trust the science” has always bothered me for two reasons: 1) science is frequently not black and white and anyone who has done hard science research knows there are plenty of competing opinions among scientists and 2) while scientific facts are facts, we still need to decide on how to act on those facts and that decision making proces…
Anyone who unironically says “Trust the science” automatically tells me that they are probably not an informed person. I trust that most research is done in good faith and at least some of it is useful. Saying 'Trust the science' might as well be saying 'Trust in God'
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What is the group demanding that is "over" what you would consider appropriate? How do their demands restrict your behavior? Personally I've never noticed trans people and their push for rights & recognition having any impact on my life whatsoever. And I say this as a devout member of a rigorous and conservative religious tradition.
Many demands, but probably the most egregious is the insistence that males be incarcerated in women's prisons if they say they are women. Several states now have policy that enables this, and female prisoners have been sexually assaulted, raped and even impregnated as a result of this. More generally, this graphic has an astute depiction of the problem: https://i.ibb.co/ZcMWLvM/no.jpg
The actual graphic:
"Lesbians must have sex with me!"
Get the fuck out of here. This is nonsense.
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Informed opinion, clearly labeled so, on interesting but non-controversial non-ideological topics can be great instigators of curiosity. What might have come before the Big Bang? Do quantum superpositions really collapse somehow based on some as yet uncharacterized law, or does our universe produce a web of alternate futures, still connected but where straightforward links are quickly statistically and irreversible o…
>What might have come before the Big Bang? Singularity.