Academia: Cesspool of Demosocialist political indoctrination

faraway,

That's about what I believe to be the case. I was just curious to know whether anyone has conducted any meaningful research on the matter.

While the show goes on in DC between the "parties", there has been a steady march on the ideological and political front within the educational institutions, regardless of whether the subject be sociology or mathematics. It seems to have more to do with the institutional environment as it were.

But when I visit the local libraries be they local community or that of an educational institution there is a distinct shift in the material available. Of course libraries have to make way for some new material - but I have a hard time finding anything that challenges the New Order ideology and political stream.
 
We'd really have to see the study to make any meaningful comment on it.
KJM - What, specifically, is the name of your text? I think you may be misrepresenting or do not understand what you have been told. I underwent similar such training in learning how to design a questionaire in Poly Sci and Sociology. We were taught about the emotional impact of certain words, question sequencing, the dress and behaviour of the pollsters themselves, etc., and went out with very similarly worded surveys covering various issues in similar neighborhoods and saw how you can indeed, "get what you poll for." Then, after the students learn how to correctly design a survey, they graduate, and then design surveys skewed to give their employers (Republican, Democrat, NAACP, NRA) the answers they want.
 
"John, I'm honestly curious where this "real world" exists."

Anywhere and everywhere (a slight oversimplification) except on campuses where the majority of the interaction is professor to professor and professor to student. I recognize that some professors get off campus and spend a great deal of time interacting with the 'real world', but too many of the ones I've known really do live and play in their ivory towers.

This puts it as well as anything I could say:

"...that sometimes some college professors get caught up in theories and forget about what works in the world. Not always true, but it seems like that does happen at colleges."

Sure, we as a society need people to explore the frontiers of knowledge and bark up the wrong tree from time to time so to speak, but they need to recognize when their search has turned up empty and move on to something productive. Locally, I don't see that happening often enough at either VCU/MCV (a gigantic state school) or the University of Richmond (a small dreadfully expensive private school.)

"Now days everyone has an opinion, but the academian's opinions are the least valuable." I must ask, have some of them done something to deserve it?

John
 
The libs are very underrepresented in the "One and only answer" disciplines in college . If you are finding out the cutting speed of 4114 steel there is an answer . Nowhere is there a place for "Now , how does that make the steel feel?" "How would the steel react if no one noticed that it was being machined?" "If the machinist cut it too short would the steel have difficulty adapting to it's new size relative to the other pieces of steel?"You get the drift .
On those courses where "any answer MIGHT be right" it is advisable to "pass the professer , not the course." An elective writing course for example . The prof. just loves sailing . What do YOU think it is advisable to dwell on ??? Shooting prarie dogs ? NASCAR ? Think not . SAILING .... OH YEAH !!! It's like kissing your sister on her birthday . There's no thrill BUT you GOTTA do it .
 
I'm curious how many of you have a college diploma? It doesn't sound like Para ever set foot on campus.

I'd enjoy hearing what experience goes into these opinions of how universities "really are".


Northwestern University, Class of 1994.
 
OSU, 1982.....Sociology!
I was amused by the one course, just writing silly essays to get a passing grade, student's take on Sociology. Yes, I am sure the 19 year olds are fooling the adults!
It takes all kinds to run a world. All kinds of conclusions can be drawn from our incomplete knowledge of the survey. I did one myself to make a point.
Para makes a good point. My living largely consists of doing things to help make sure people don't blow themselves up or start a fire that would burn the building. The technical and chemical aspects of the job do, indeed, tend to have very simple answers as Para quite rightly points out and it is pretty much cut and dried, no surprises there. The truly difficult part of my job calls for the skills that I acquired studying Sociology and people. It's far more complex and demanding than working with materials to make sure people follow proper procedures.
I think conservatives in a very general way have a "stand pat" attitude, are more reliable, and do better in stable types of situations. I think liberals in a general way do better when conditions are changing, they tend to go against fixed values and protocol.
 
I'm curious how many of you have a college diploma? It doesn't sound like Para ever set foot on campus.
Click to expand...

Associate in Machine Tool Technology 1975 NYCCC (Voorhees)
Associate in Diesel and Heavy Equipment Technology 1995 Santa Ana College Santa Ana CA

These studies depended in a knowledge of things that can be defined and applied . The math does not change if the person is rich or poor . Angles are the same in every neighborhood . The part is either in tolerance or it is not . (And that is at 68 degrees F.) The truck either runs or it does not . Next time you bring your car in for work consider the following . You get it back and it runs really bad . The service advisor tells you that the mechanic that worked on it had a rough childhood . His mother was a Republican and his father owned guns . Therefore his feelings are more important than your cars performance . Better yet , take it to an Art History major . They can paint a picture of a smiling car moving very fast . Then you can show it to the car and hope it mimics the picture .My credentials were issued by someone that KNEW I was competent because I had proven it . Not someone that thought I MIGHT be after all the mitigating circumstances were factored in . You have your world and I have mine .
 
The libs are very underrepresented in the "One and only answer" disciplines in college . If you are finding out the cutting speed of 4114 steel there is an answer . Nowhere is there a place for "Now , how does that make the steel feel?" "How would the steel react if no one noticed that it was being machined?" "If the machinist cut it too short would the steel have difficulty adapting to it's new size relative to the other pieces of steel?"You get the drift .
Click to expand...

Hilarious! :D
 
Handy does postdoc count as a degree or a certificate? Leaving it out I've still got got too many degrees to be trusted by any sane person. ;) I've seen 'way too many professors, assistant professors, associate professors and instructors who didn't know their bohunkus from a jelly doughnut. Paratrooper is exactly on target.
 
Para talks about concrete jobs that only have simple, mathematical answers. Any job that doesn't fit in this category is hopelessly lost.


I'm a pilot. Every flight I make about a hundred judgement calls. I zealously combine formula with personal technique. Sometimes I even have style.

I had thought I was engaged in an exacting professional trade, but apparently I'm a member of the soft science club that can only lead to sloppy thinking, since I there is rarely "One and only one answer".


Which person is best equipped to deal with the real world? A machinist that likes to deal in the "one right answer", or someone that is able to see shades of grey without breaking into a sweat?
 
This is rambling but it is too late tonight to change.

I had thought I was engaged in an exacting professional trade, but apparently I'm a member of the soft science club that can only lead to sloppy thinking, since I there is rarely "One and only one answer".
Click to expand...
OK, so you recognize ambiguity and also recognize the possibility that hard answers can exist.

In his classic book, "The Evolution of Civilizations" Carroll Quigley discussed his recollection that he had once tried to find a perfect quartz crystal among hundreds. He finally admitted he never could, but he also admitted that there was a theoretically attainable perfect crystal. He then discussed the fact that these imperfect crystals nevertheless had a recognizable pattern despite their imperfection.

How we construct our reality is by pattern but it is also by consensus. We understand that six is an abstraction but nevertheless we use that abstraction to describe the number of faces on the cross section of a crystal. If we used base four arithmetic we would say there were 12 faces and if we used base two we would say there were 110 faces. But we would do so by consensus. each answer would be as real as the others.

The trouble with liberal arts academia in general and WC in specific is that they have chosen to construct a consensual reality which not only bypasses our common one but it is an antithesis. (Remember Marx' concept that thesis +antithesis = synthesis?)

Imagine a group of people who decided that not only would they do everything in base four but they would not only exclude calculation on base 10 but would judge its value to be less than base four. They would then try to reform the rest of us. All our machine tooling would be useless, not because it didn't work, but because it didn't match theirs.

Sound familiar? Think of the metric revolution. Metric parts don't work any better or worse, but they are different and using them means that our old machinery becomes worthless.

Then we find there are people who apply the same utility principle in social science. They increase the utility of their own construction of 'perfect society' by destroying the society which was working up until the time they started substituting parts.

So the problem has less to do with fuzzy versus hard or shades of grey versus blsck and white. The problem has to do with 'We the People' were in power and were running the country well enough, not perfectly but well enough to get along, but the social tinkerers and academicians would like to change things where they will run it and we will not.
 
Or imagine people that decided to do everything in base two!


Oh wait, that already happened and created computing. :rolleyes:




I think you all have some swell theories about what goes on in every single academics head. Congratulations on figuring out the conspiracy so accurately while not missing a beat from your "real world" lives.
 
Wow! You guys are way smarter than I. I only want to get a C and move onto bigger things. I draw my opinions solely from my experience. I have yet to have a sociologist teach me much beyond the trivial. More women survived the Holocaust than men. More women survive to old-age than men, and the constant favorite: The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Rarely can you find a sociology prof who doesn't think there's some vast right-wing conspiracy going down at Bohemian Grove where right after they sacrifice a child from a 3rd world country and drink her blood, they plot to take over countries so that their rich oil buddies in Texas can rule the world.

I didn't disagree with any of it and it won't help me one iota with telling a Rancher how to squeeze the most profit from a hunting operation or how to reduce his tax burden by using conservation or preservation easements. Nope- Sociology is to me, a self-serving science that keeps sociologists employed so that they can stay employed. I may be too harsh though.

I have to take a social science, hence, I took the easiest one I could find which happens to be Sociology. Economics was already used to fulfill a different degree requirement, so forgive me if my two brushes with sociology ended up being a "why you should vote Democrat or Green" session and not very useful at knowing why groups of people do what they do.

Nomatter what, I am almost done and I will be done with a B rather than the D I would have earned in a real social SCIENCE.
 
Considering the extent to which the Hegelian dialectic has been and is used, I meet very few people who even understand how it works.
 
Could the moderator please delete my embarassing first few posts to this thread? I believe that it does not belong here and spoils the quality of this thread. I would like to be able to show this to my fellow students without embarrasing myself.

I am confused, after this thread started I first wanted to take the sociology discipline by changing my degree, then I hated the "soft sciences", then I respected the sciences, then...MY MIND IS GOING TO EXPLODE!!!!!!!!!
 
Last edited:
Fred that is a semantic trap. Hegel developed the idea and he used it but he never coined the terms. :D I'll give you a hearty pat on the back if you can find them in any of Hegel's writing.

LAK, that is because they have lost his idealism. Marx was a pessemistic SOB. Nobody now can study Hegel without Marxist contamination of their thought.

IMHO of course, as I don't know doodly squat about nothin'. ;)
 
Which in a indirect manner came out of Aristotle. Yeesh, can't escape these people...
Concerning the diffuse thinking of liberal arts and sociology and the like, it's very well suited to political manipulation. So, an A+B+C approach has merit, but when applied to politics it's too limited. And too easy to negate by twisting the meanings.
That's often where literalists of any kind, do very poorly when entering the political fray. They do not realize that others do not have to accept the limited parameters in which the ideas are set.
Alas, those who attain and maintain power...do tend to do so by shifting the definitions of truth to meet their needs. That's why reading this horribly diffuse stuff is useful...even if it's confined to one book "The Prince".
And that's also why those who try to defend the RKBA's by absolute statements, or by literally citing constitutional passages...tend to do poorly agaisnt the diffusionists. They're playing checkers and their rivals are fencing in the rhetorical manner.
So mayhaps passing off the academics entirely is a big mistake...often the mode of thinking they espouse is politically effective, although it may be of little use in cad/cam designing a machine implement.
And on the question about educashon...oopsie...terminal degreed in my little field.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top