Progress In Iraq Continues...

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In my opinion a midwestern dairy farmer is more likely to hold a realistic political view than is a professor of political science on one of the coasts.

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This baffles me. In political science you have a bunch of very intelligent people who have steeped themselves in the study of the actual empirical world. Further, they tend to take fairly seriously the problem of inference. What does it take to make a causal claim about social processes? What kind of evidence would you need?

In contrast, it seems likely that your average midwestern dairy farmer has very little clue about empirics beyond their immediate environs and a rather simplistic view about things like causality.

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I'm judging the tree by the fruit it bears. My take (which might be off, admittedly) is that the type(political science professor) typically believes in far-leftist fallacies, in the myth of multiculturalism, in hate-crime laws, in speech code rules on campus, in other such misguided things, and might well make excuse for Castro; whereas type(plain farmer) generally understands that leaving others alone and less laws and lower taxes/lower spending is good, that free enterprise is better than every other system, that Castro is doing evil in restricting free speech and in holding political prisoners, etc.

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Are you positing some kind of innate "natural intelligence" that is only perverted by seriously studying the social world?

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Not exactly. But unlike in the hard sciences, I do think that the lofty maze of ideas must somehow confuse some in the social "sciences" who then find trouble bringing those ideas down to earth in a practical manner. Of course, that doesn't apply to all. But the impression I have, of type(political science professor) as being from fairly Left to radically Left, suggests to me that they understand theory a lot better than they understand reality. Which, of course, is somewhat ironic because ultimately that which they study is very much intended for application in the real world.

[sam h]

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I'm judging the tree by the fruit it bears. My take (which might be off, admittedly) is that the type(political science professor) typically believes in far-leftist fallacies, in the myth of multiculturalism, in hate-crime laws, in speech code rules on campus, in other such misguided things, and might well make excuse for Castro; whereas type(plain farmer) generally understands that leaving others alone and less laws and lower taxes/lower spending is good, that free enterprise is better than every other system, that Castro is doing evil in restricting free speech and in holding political prisoners, etc.

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In political science, very little research is conducted toward things like hate-crime laws, multiculturalism, etc. In my experience, most political scientists are fairly skeptical about a lot of this stuff in their personal beliefs.

The intersection of politics and markets is another question, as is international relations. You are not going to find many communists in political science, but you will find equally few libertarians and hardcore supply-siders. Basically what you find most often is "third way" center-left types. Regarding IR theorists, the dominant body of literature for a long time has been "realism," which is far from a squishy leftist position. But most IR theorists, and most "realists," are critics of Bush's foreign policy.

Regarding these issues, your position seems to come down to this: You disagree with them, and therefore think midwest dairy farmers are smarter. There's no need to get into another debate about the merits of respective positions on these issues. But I think you would do well to give more thought to the idea that some of these people who have spent their lives studying issues like political economy and IR theory might have something to say.

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But unlike in the hard sciences, I do think that the lofty maze of ideas must somehow confuse some in the social "sciences" who then find trouble bringing those ideas down to earth in a practical manner. Of course, that doesn't apply to all. But the impression I have, of type(political science professor) as being from fairly Left to radically Left, suggests to me that they understand theory a lot better than they understand reality. Which, of course, is somewhat ironic because ultimately that which they study is very much intended for application in the real world.

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I think there is some merit to this point, with a significant caveat. I'm not sure its about understanding "theory" but not "reality." IMO, the problem is more like this but you may disagree: If you examine the "reality" of the social world long enough and hard enough and take seriously enough reservations about inference and causality, you end up in a position where it becomes intellectually dishonest to strongly enunciate blanket positions like "freer markets are always better," "social development and greater freedom will lead to democracy," "fewer taxes is good," or "extensive redistribution will improve society."

Basically, political scientists tend to see most of these issues operating in an enormous grey area and as fundamentally contextual. Consequently, they take all this knowledge about "reality" and debate within the world of "theory" but have difficulty translating it into the types of policy positions that are common in ordinary discourse about politics, which tend to be pretty extreme and often assert all kinds of causal relationships without much evidence (true of both left and right, IMO). So there is a way in which a lot of knowledge is being generated but then not very usefully applied, and political scientists are definitely partly to fault for this. But I think one of the big problems is that a core characteristic of that knowledge itself - that things are uncertain, there are very few black and white issues, and that almost everything is contextual and depends on many, many variables - is not well received by politicians or a public that very badly wants to believe that their particular set of beliefs is "right" and in line with "reality."

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My objection is not to the beliefs of all political science professors, but rather to beliefs such as: "the US is the greatest oppressor in the world"; "all cultures and traditions are of equal merit" (an obviously false claim when one considers both the relative efficacies of various cultures in providing for their own people, as well as the abysmal status of human rights under certain cultural traditions); the lunatic political rants of the likes of Ward Churchill and Nicholas de Genova; and various other nonsenses. It isn't just that I disagree with these beliefs, I'm pretty sure you do too; and it isn't necessary to construct proofs of the correctness of our positions in order to so assert (although if we wanted to waste a lot of time I'm sure either of us could do so).

The typical Wisconsin dairy farmer, or New Hampshire pig farmer, typically would recognize the nonsense in such views. Hence they ARE in a sense considerably "smarter" than those vastly studied crackpots who believe such hooey. And my take is that the concentration of such crackpots is typically higher in poli-sci academia than in other more mundane disciplines.

I do agree with your points regarding the complexity of many social and economic issies, and that the optimal position (and solution) regarding many matters may be neither black nor white but often a more complex melange. I'm not taking issue with that, nor with the more moderate thinkers. But anyone who thinks that communism is better than capitalism, or that all cultural practices are of equal merit and equally deserving of respect, or that the US is the greatest net force for evil and oppression in the world, or that all white Americans are racist oppressors--is just a crackpot who holds indefensible positions. And as mentioned, you know where I think a relatively high concentration of these crackpots can be found, and it isn't out in the fields mowing hay.

[DVaut1]

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My objection is not to the beliefs of all political science professors, but rather to beliefs such as: "the US is the greatest oppressor in the world"; "all cultures and traditions are of equal merit" (an obviously false claim when one considers both the relative efficacies of various cultures in providing for their own people, as well as the abysmal status of human rights under certain cultural traditions); the lunatic political rants of the likes of Ward Churchill and Nicholas de Genova; and various other nonsenses. It isn't just that I disagree with these beliefs, I'm pretty sure you do too; and it isn't necessary to construct proofs of the correctness of our positions in order to so assert (although if we wanted to waste a lot of time I'm sure either of us could do so).

The typical Wisconsin dairy farmer, or New Hampshire pig farmer, typically would recognize the nonsense in such views. Hence they ARE in a sense considerably "smarter" than those vastly studied crackpots who believe such hooey. And my take is that the concentration of such crackpots is typically higher in poli-sci academia than in other more mundane disciplines.

I do agree with your points regarding the complexity of many social and economic issies, and that the optimal position (and solution) regarding many matters may be neither black nor white but often a more complex melange. I'm not taking issue with that, nor with the more moderate thinkers. But anyone who thinks that communism is better than capitalism, or that all cultural practices are of equal merit and equally deserving of respect, or that the US is the greatest net force for evil and oppression in the world, or that all white Americans are racist oppressors--is just a crackpot who holds indefensible positions. And as mentioned, you know where I think a relatively high concentration of these crackpots can be found, and it isn't out in the fields mowing hay.

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Neither Ward Churchill nor Nicholas de Genova were political science professors; Ward Churchill was an ethnic studies professor, and I believe de Genova was an anthropologist.

Call it nitpicky if you must, but speaking as someone who worked for a time doing research (and studying) at the aforementioned U of M (where Juan Cole is - and he's not in the poli sci department), it was my experience that none of the political science professors were particularly radical, and I had somewhat close contacts with a good deal of the faculty - which isn't to say that there weren't 'radical' professors at Michigan, only that (in my experience) they weren't in the poli sci department - the only real, intense, self-avowed 'radical' I ever encountered at Michigan wasn't tenured, was in the History department, and (I believe) no longer teaches/does research there.

I would be willing to bet, if you went through the US News and World Report's Top 25 National Universities and viewed the political science faculty pages on each school's webpage, and browsed their CVs, you'd find very few (and I mean very few) 'radicals' in the mold of Ward Churchill, if he's what our paradign of 'radical' is. I suspect you'd find many who served in relatively high positions in the government/at reputable think tanks, etc.

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Neither Ward Churchill nor Nicholas de Genova were political science professors; Ward Churchill was an ethnic studies professor, and I believe de Genova was an anthropologist.

Call it nitpicky if you must,...

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I don't presume you're trying to derail this discussion or just being nitpicky, but you're really taking my last post out of the context of the entire line of reasoning in the thread. Nor for that matter did I state that the two profs Churchill and de Genova were poli-sci profs.

If you had followed the prior posts of mine in this thread you would realize that I wasn't referring only to poli-sci profs, but rather to poli-sci *types* and as well to some in the larger mold of the educated liberal elite, and was initially comparing some opinions of the educated liberal elite to the opinions of some such as farmers, and raising the matter of who was more often or more generally correct in their political views.

If you go back and reread the entire string of responses right now, you will see that you are here isolating for argument something which was not intended to be isolated. As the discussion progressed it became a more convenient shorthand to discuss things a certain way in order to try to illustrate a point. I shouldn't have to write every post in a developing thread as if it were a post in isolation in order to not be misunderstood.

Also, I did not claim that most are like Ward Churchill, so there is no need to point out that only few are like him. I certainly don't think most are like him, and I'd presume that most people would share this view since he's obviously quite extreme.

[DVaut1]

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Neither Ward Churchill nor Nicholas de Genova were political science professors; Ward Churchill was an ethnic studies professor, and I believe de Genova was an anthropologist.

Call it nitpicky if you must,...

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I don't presume you're trying to derail this discussion or just being nitpicky, but you're really taking my last post out of the context of the entire line of reasoning in the thread. Nor for that matter did I state that the two profs Churchill and de Genova were poli-sci profs.

If you had followed the prior posts of mine in this thread you would realize that I wasn't referring only to poli-sci profs, but rather to poli-sci *types* and as well to some in the larger mold of the educated liberal elite, and was initially comparing some opinions of the educated liberal elite to the opinions of some such as farmers, and raising the matter of who was more often or more generally correct in their political views.

If you go back and reread the entire string of responses right now, you will see that you are here isolating for argument something which was not intended to be isolated. As the discussion progressed it became a more convenient shorthand to discuss things a certain way in order to try to illustrate a point. I shouldn't have to write every post in a developing thread as if it were a post in isolation in order to not be misunderstood.

Also, I did not claim that most are like Ward Churchill, so there is no need to point out that only few are like him. I certainly don't think most are like him, and I'd presume that most people would share this view since he's obviously quite extreme.

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I can promise I'm not trying to derail the discussion or purposely being nitpicky; and I think if you look at sam h's last two posts in this thread, it seem to me (from my vantage point) that this conversation had certainly veered in the direction of political science/political science professors. In fact, I've just re-read both posts twice, and your responses to them, and I'm rather perplexed that you feel this didn't become a discussion centered around political science professors.

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Jeez, DVaut1, please read the entire line of responses, not just the last two;-) And realize that discussions morph slightly when points are trying to be made or illustrated.

Anyway I hope I've clarified things to your satisfaction. And if not, well, so be it [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[tolbiny]

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What would be an example of a simple and plain political view?


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That everyone should mind their own damn business.

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How is htis better than other political views? Its at least as niave as communisum- with perhaps less opportunity for curruption- perhaps.

[tolbiny]

So what your "simple" poitical position is based upon is a very persoanl and likely nuanced position as to what is "your damned buisness".

[DVaut1]

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Jeez, DVaut1, please read the entire line of responses, not just the last two;-) And realize that discussions morph slightly when points are trying to be made or illustrated.

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Like I said - I have alot of respect for political science professors, and I won't deny I have an interest in defending the 'science' [as I was a political science major as an undergrad, and spent a good deal of time doing research there (at least the grunt work end of it) that I didn't find meaningless, nor detached from reality]; so yes, I'm going to take umbrage when the good work that occurs in political science is dismissed, and its wisdom replaced with that of diary farmers.

But I think that's debatable. Some people place their bets with political science professors, others with dairy farmers. To each his own. I certainly place my bets (as to who has more wisdom) with the professors, but I'll grant that perhaps dairy farmers have better; I don't know many dairy farmers, so I won't dismiss their wisdom off-hand.

Like I've also said before, though - I find language important. I think word choice is important. And I think syntax is important.

To that end, I don't think it was an accident (although I may be wrong) that you associated the study of 'political science' with 'Ward Churchill' - that is to say, 'Ward Churchill' is universally dismissed (fairly or not) as a crackpot, and to call him a 'political science professor type' is (in my estimation) meant to degrade the study of political science (in an effort, I think, to try to further your point that diary farmers know more than political science types).

So while you may think it's no big deal, or nitpicky, to point that Ward Churchill is indeed not a political science professor, I think it's important to point out that many of the academics the right so thoroughly dismisses as 'loony leftists' (Chomsky, Churchill, Nicholas de Genova, etc) don't study political science, nor do they work in political science, but are experts in other disciplines.

So consider this as my way of sticking up for political science, something that I don't think is irrelevant to this discussion.