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Shut Up Or Else

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This is a blog on why we believe and do what we do, why we pretend otherwise, how we might do better, and what our descendants might do, if they don't all die.
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Shut Up Or Else

Robin Hanson
Jan 18, 2010
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Shut Up Or Else

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The overwhelmingly liberal tilt of university professors has been explained by everything from outright bias to higher I.Q. scores. … A pair of sociologists think they may have an answer: typecasting. … The academic profession “has acquired such a strong reputation for liberalism and secularism that over the last 35 years few politically or religiously conservative students, but many liberal and secular ones, have formed the aspiration to become professors,” they write in the paper, “Why Are Professors Liberal?” That is especially true of their own field, sociology. … To Mr. Gross, accusations by conservatives of bias and student brainwashing are self-defeating. “The irony is that the more conservatives complain about academia’s liberalism,” he said, “the more likely it’s going to remain a bastion of liberalism.”

More here.  “Shut up about this imbalance or it’ll be worse.”  Can you imagine a sociologist recommending this response to a huge imbalance elsewhere, say a [disapproved] gender, ethnic, or sexual preference imbalance among executives, top colleges, country clubs, or political offices?   But when it comes to imbalances in their own profession, …  HT Tyler.

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Shut Up Or Else

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Overcoming Bias Commenter
May 15

If a professor teaches a subject with the point of helping students discover truth, It shouldn't matter what normative political view he/she has, as they are irrelevant to finding the truth and expressing it descriptively.

Physics and chemistry don't change based on subjective interpretations --- they either work or don't, and so should economics, psychology etc.. Either Why should any science, social or not be different?

If the basic ideas of a field do change based on the political views of the teacher, then that is a statement about the rigorousness of the field or its department, and not an issue with the personalities of the lecturers. For instance, why is it that one worries so much about bias from an English prof being an ideologue, while no one cares if a physics prof is.

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Overcoming Bias Commenter
May 15

They never created a “left-wing authoritarianism”...

Left Wing Authoritarians have a philosopher or ideologist as their authority, while RWAs use the traditional authorities in their society.

...which sees gender as totally socially constructed.

Gender is by definition socially constructed. Sex on the other hand is biological.

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