Academia's Rejection Of Diversity -- Intellectual And Political Diversity
American Enterprise Institute president Arthur C. Brooks writes at The New York Times:
New research also shows that academia has itself stopped short in both the understanding and practice of true diversity -- the diversity of ideas -- and that the problem is taking a toll on the quality and accuracy of scholarly work. This year, a team of scholars from six universities studying ideological diversity in the behavioral sciences published a paper in the journal Behavioral and Brain Sciences that details a shocking level of political groupthink in academia. The authors show that for every politically conservative social psychologist in academia there are about 14 liberal social psychologists.Why the imbalance? The researchers found evidence of discrimination and hostility within academia toward conservative researchers and their viewpoints. In one survey cited, 82 percent of social psychologists admitted they would be less likely to support hiring a conservative colleague than a liberal scholar with equivalent qualifications.
...One of the study's authors, Philip E. Tetlock of the University of Pennsylvania, put it to me more bluntly. Expecting trustworthy results on politically charged topics from an "ideologically incestuous community," he explained, is "downright delusional."
...In a recent exercise, [The World Bank] presented identical data sets to employees under two different pretexts. Some employees were told the data were measuring the effectiveness of a skin rash cream, while others were told the same data measured the effects of minimum wage laws on poverty. The politicized context of the second question led to more erroneous analyses, and the accuracy of left-leaning respondents plummeted when the data conflicted with their worldview.
Improving ideological diversity is not a fundamentally political undertaking. Rather, it is a question of humility. Proper scholarship is based on the simple virtues of tolerance, openness and modesty. Having people around who think differently thus improves not only science, but also character.
Many academics and intellectuals see their community as a major force for diversity and open-mindedness throughout American society, and take justifiable pride in this image. Now they can be consistent and apply those values to their own profession, by celebrating ideological diversity.
A NYT commenter:
Charles Day
Great article. Liberal bias is indeed real. The bias is not a question of who's right on a given issue, but rather an automatic rejection of a conservative viewpoint with out even listening to it. Yes, the same bias exists among conservatives as well. It's a shame too many intelligent people people in our society just don't want to hear another viewpoint. They don't want hear anything which might undermine their own intellectual construct and make believe world.
This is one of the things I love about this comments section -- that it's a free speech zone. There are times I change my point of view because people here persuade me, and I truly appreciate that. That also helps me remember to look at all the sides and check for my own bias, which makes me a better writer and thinker.
via @adamkissel
This is not unique to behavioral science. The recent letter by global warming "scientists" asking the federal government to use RICO statutes against those guilty of heterodoxy comes to mind. (I use quotes around "scientists" because real scientists do not seek to use the power of government to enforce heterodoxy.)
I find the increasingly open willingness by a portion of the progressive/leftist/liberal movement to try and use government to suppress heterodoxy quite alarming, even more when government entities seem increasingly willing to use their power to attack heterodoxy.
Incidentally, this is also why I oppose Obama's efforts to use federal funds to conduct "gun violence" research. I find it highly unlikely that the research will be conducted in an intellectually honest manner.
Bill O Rights at October 31, 2015 7:55 AM
Remember, if you disagree with a Progressive, you not only are wrong, you also have badthought, and more importantly, you have evil intentions.
I'm waiting for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders to list conservatism as a mental illness. Ah, the old Soviet may still exist!
I R A Darth Aggie at October 31, 2015 7:56 AM
The RICO letter writer Bill refers to is about to find out he bit off more than he can chew. Congresscritters are starting to look into his grants.
In addition to himself, he also hired his wife and daughter to work for his research group. I have a feeling that once the accounts go thru the books with a fine tooth comb, he's going to wish he'd kept his mouth shut. In addition to those grants, he was drawing a salary from George Mason University.
Maybe his wife and daughter did outstanding work. But the appearance of nepotism should have raised flags. I'm pretty sure he was double billing for his hours, tho, which is a no-no.
I R A Darth Aggie at October 31, 2015 8:03 AM
Uhh, much to my embarrassment, I used "heterodoxy" in my post, when I should have used "orthodoxy."
Perhaps, since it is Halloween, I can blame it on gremlins.
Sigh.
Bill O Rights at October 31, 2015 8:43 AM
Bill O Rights: Uhh, much to my embarrassment, I used "heterodoxy" in my post, when I should have used "orthodoxy."
Oh that's funny. In your first post you used "heterodoxy" four times. If you change the second time to "orthodoxy", and leave the other three as "heterodoxy"... the I agree with everything you said.
Ken R at October 31, 2015 9:14 AM
Many Psychology Findings Not as Strong as Claimed
( www.nytimes dot com/2015/08/28/science/
many-social-science-findings-not-as-strong-as-claimed-study-says.html )
=== ===
[edited] Research psychologists have spent years double-checking what they considered important work. Many were volunteers.
They attempted to reproduce 100 studies published in three leading psychology journals. More than half did not hold up when retested. They have confirmed the worst fears of scientists who worried that the field needed a strong correction.
The vetted studies were considered part of the core knowledge by which scientists understand the dynamics of personality, relationships, learning and memory.
=== ===
A possible explanation for political bias in the soft sciences. These faculty know that most studies are untrustworthy. They know what they themselves do to meet the pressures of publishing and career advancement. Few studies will be checked and one can claim inadvertent error when discovered.
In an atmosphere of fudging data and results, there is no cost to rejecting for political reasons the results one doesn't like. The results might as well support progressive values if they are going to be mostly wrong.
This also occurs in the hard sciences when there is political funding, for example Climate Science.
( pjmedia dot com/eddriscoll/2012/03/03/unless-we-announce-disasters-no-one-will-listen/ )
Lying for climate change
3/3/12 - Ed Driscoll [edited]
=== ===
It is a fascinating development when people admit that they are lying for their cause.
• Prof. Chris Folland, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research
“The data doesn’t matter. We’re not basing our recommendations on the data. We’re basing them on the climate models.”
• Dr David Frame, Climate modeler, Oxford University
“The models are convenient fictions that provide something very useful.”
• Paul Watson, Co-founder of Greenpeace
“It doesn’t matter what is true, it only matters what people believe is true.”
• Sir John Houghton, First chairman of the IPCC
“Unless we announce disasters no one will listen.”
• Christine Stewart, former Canadian Minister of the Environment
“No matter if the science of global warming is all phony … climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.”
=== ===
Andrew_M_Garland at October 31, 2015 11:33 AM
Ken R,
Why can't they invent a spell checker to prevent this from happening? Must be a Microsoft microagression. heh.
Bill O Rights at October 31, 2015 11:35 AM
While only anecdotal, I did hear/watch professors on a hiring committee when I was in grad school talk about how they liked one candidate because he agreed with their own ideas and reject candidates because they had different ideas.
In other words don't hire someone who might challenge their viewpoint.
charles at October 31, 2015 4:21 PM
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