Liberal Bias Is Killing Social Science

[Glen Contrarian]

I am as much in favor of liberal military officers as I am of conservative social scientists.

Would you agree with the statement that the conservative mindset is more effective in some areas than others, and that the liberal mindset is more effective in some areas than others?

 

[Jack Hays]

Would you agree with the statement that the conservative mindset is more effective in some areas than others, and that the liberal mindset is more effective in some areas than others?

No, I would not.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

No. Global warming remains contentious,

Not in the scientific community it isn't. Its a contentious notion at an ideological level, but despite the amount of misinformation floating around the internet, its not a contentious issue in the scientific community.

but the imputation to conservatives of widespread disbelief in evolution, or confusion about the age of the Earth, or racism at a level beyond that of the general population is a liberal trope.

The conservative rejection of evolution is backed up by God knows how many polls:

Republicans’ views on evolution | Pew Research Center

Majority of Republicans Doubt Theory of Evolution

Percentage of Republicans who believe in evolution is shrinking - CSMonitor.com

I am certain that in academia there are more liberals than conservatives. In the scientific community in general, most scientists are not particularly ideological, but when pressed there are more moderates and liberals than conservatives. Speaking from personal experience from nearly 20 years in IT, I can tell you that in the broad spectrum of computer science there are more liberals and moderates than conservatives. It has been my experience that hard core conservatives almost universally make inferior developers and systems / network admins / engineers. I don't know if this is due to the neural wiring that leads to being very conservative or what, but that has been my experience as really hardcore conservatives in IT tend to be rather linear in their thinking and rely more on intuition when troubleshooting - both of which are bad qualities in any field of applied science. I would imagine this is the case in all fields of science other than economics.

On a side note, extreme liberals tend to suck at IT as well, but there are not nearly as many extreme libs out there as hardcore conservatives.

 

[Jack Hays]

Not in the scientific community it isn't. Its a contentious notion at an ideological level, but despite the amount of misinformation floating around the internet, its not a contentious issue in the scientific community.

I'll concede Repubs have a weakness on evolution.

On global warming, please look up Richard Lindzen, Fred Singer, John Chrisrty, Roy Spencer and (my personal favorite) Henrik Svensmark.

 

[AmericanSpartan]

Let me get this straight. Many conservatives believe that global warming is a conspiracy, evolution is a myth, the Earth is 6000 years old, racism is not a pervasive issue, trickle-down economics works, starting wars in other countries increases our safety and host of other theories that the scientific method has firmly rejected and ACADEMIA is the problem?

I think the problem is the anti-intellectual road that conservatism has taken, particularly since Reagan was elected. Fortunately, some conservatives have not taken this road including several of the conservative professors in college that I had. With that in mind, I would suggest that conservatives who actually want to become academics (it's been my impression that conservatives generally do NOT want to enter academia) put down their Bill O'Reilly supplied tin foil hats and follow their lead.

That said, I'm open to more research on the subject. It's entirely possible that I'm missing something and that true anti-conservative bias is a problem in academia, but I'm going to need more than one study in a single discipline to believe that conservatives aren't doing it to themselves.

Global warming is not happen, no major warming in 17 years.

Earth is not 6000 years old.

Left wing racism is very pervasive

Trickle down does work.

some conservatives have not taken this road including several of the conservative professors in college that I had.

Why should we? We have not had a track record of epic failure..

 

[AmericanSpartan]

Not in the scientific community it isn't. Its a contentious notion at an ideological level, but despite the amount of misinformation floating around the internet, its not a contentious issue in the scientific community.



The conservative rejection of evolution is backed up by God knows how many polls:

Republicans’ views on evolution | Pew Research Center

Majority of Republicans Doubt Theory of Evolution

Percentage of Republicans who believe in evolution is shrinking - CSMonitor.com

I am certain that in academia there are more liberals than conservatives. In the scientific community in general, most scientists are not particularly ideological, but when pressed there are more moderates and liberals than conservatives. Speaking from personal experience from nearly 20 years in IT, I can tell you that in the broad spectrum of computer science there are more liberals and moderates than conservatives. It has been my experience that hard core conservatives almost universally make inferior developers and systems / network admins / engineers. I don't know if this is due to the neural wiring that leads to being very conservative or what, but that has been my experience as really hardcore conservatives in IT tend to be rather linear in their thinking and rely more on intuition when troubleshooting - both of which are bad qualities in any field of applied science. I would imagine this is the case in all fields of science other than economics.

On a side note, extreme liberals tend to suck at IT as well, but there are not nearly as many extreme libs out there as hardcore conservatives.

You mean the same people how are human and have been wrong many times before.