quote: But if you have left your children's education up to others, and therefore not taught them to take charge of it for themselves, then your kids will be far more likely to be captured by a strange and hostile ideology whose avowed goal is to destroy most of the traditional beliefs and cultural practices of America.
(And just watch: Those who deny there is any such ideological program dominating the universities will also snidely ask if, by "traditional beliefs and cultural practices of America," I mean slavery or segregation or some other odious thing that we are well shut of and which I would never advocate restoring.
I'm actually curious as to which traditional beliefs and cultural practices OSC thinks that liberal college faculties have vowed to destroy. While he attempts to dodge the issue here, I'd be interested to hear which NON-odious practices he thinks are being targeted by the P.C. movement.
Posted by monteverdi (Member # 2896) on :
Pretty soon there will be no 'others' left
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
actually I thought it was a lot better than a couple of his previous recent pieces.
AJ
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Marriage and family and obligations to others.
I had one advanced English lit class where, out of a class of 12, five were engaged or married over the course of the semester.
The last day my (well-spoken, sweet, dedicated, brilliant) professor looked us over and wailed, "What has happened here?! I have failed you!"
Two years later, I saw him in the English building after he'd gotten back from a long sabbatical. He shook my hand and said, "You're not married yet, are you?" "Nope." "Congratulations! I'm so glad."
I can see OSC objecting to that.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Oh, I agree. I'm not actually criticizing the article OR his position, either -- I'd much rather criticize his decision to laud Sean Russell and Anne McCaffery as examples of interesting authors that have recently drawn him back into genre reading *grin* -- but I AM deeply curious as to which practices he means, here. Frankly, I think it leaves a big empty space in the article; he spends a great deal of time arguing that the sky is falling, and then doesn't give us a single example of a single meteor (except to say that he doesn't like the icky kind of meteors, anyway.)
(Edit: I was responding to Banna.)
-----
Kat, I can see that. *laugh* Although I think there's a distinction to be drawn between obligatory marriage and responsibility to others.
[ September 08, 2003, 04:37 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Since he talked about 65% female attendance, maybe he is talking about traditional roles in society. Women raising the kids and all. And none of that nonsense about politically correct language.
:hums:
"Back when a smoke was a smoke, and grooving was grooving." Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
Uh...traditional marriage defined as between a man and a woman, maybe? Gender roles, where it is okay (and not considered a waste) for a woman to be highly educated, yet after graduation choose to be a stay at home mom. Perhaps the value that pornography is destructive and not worth studying for credit? The idea that having religious conviction does not automatically make you a kook. The value that abstaining from sex until marriage is a choice to be honored and admired.
To name just a few possibilities.
edit: to add "possibilities" to that last sentence. I can only guess why OSC has concerns about public universities.
[ September 08, 2003, 04:57 PM: Message edited by: jeniwren ]
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Hey, I stop to talk to my kid when he comes home from school and look what happened!
Posted by monteverdi (Member # 2896) on :
My personal impression is that the Universities, far from doing anything like teaching something as complex and interesting as an 'ideology' are simply running a business - more or less like 'Benetton' - and about as meaningful - now this is ideology too (consumer - whatever) but nothing remotely dangerous.
I'm sure examples would amount to a lament of Post-modernity etc. and it's absence of real presence (a hole conveniently filled by 'family' the new euphemism for 'religion' in Amercia...
The Muslim's have a head start in this area.
[ September 08, 2003, 04:43 PM: Message edited by: monteverdi ]
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
So OSC is mainly concerned about college's effect on students' perception of sex and sex roles? His position seems awfully alarmist, if that's all he's worried about. I mean, he used phrases like "strange and hostile" and "most," implying that we're up against some kind of devious, wide-reaching cabal; I'd be really disappointed if he's just ticked about free condoms and pseudo-empowerment rants.
[ September 08, 2003, 04:47 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by blacwolve (Member # 2972) on :
I think he's concerned with the way religions (specifically Christianity) are actively scorned on campuses.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
I don't know exactly what he's alarmed about, but I don't think he's making it up, either.
I loved this professor -he's one of the best teachers I ever had. I am sure part of his attitude came from the sacrifices he had made in order to be the incredible teacher that he was. In his defense, he was also happily married to a fellow professor and had two little girls. The life he was advocating had worked out very well for him, and he loved it. He only wished us the best.
He's also the professor that convinced me to change my major away from literature. I liked him very much personally, and he taught us how to be scholars, but I don't think I agreed with a single word he said the entire class. The most vivid memory is when he presented his theory of why the heroines of so many books did not have mothers: Because after having the kid, their work is done, so might as well kill them off - that there was nothing the not-well-educated woman mother did besides the physical bit, and so could add nothing to the story.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
quote: Uh...traditional marriage defined as between a man and a woman, maybe?
I'm not sure how to respond to this point. Can you elaborate on how research would be conducted to reach the decision that marriage should only be between a man and a woman?
quote: Gender roles, where it is okay (and not considered a waste) for a woman to be highly educated, yet after graduation choose to be a stay at home mom.
I know for a fact that there is lots of research out there that supports the idea that children are healthiest when a parent/mother stays at home with them.
quote: Perhaps the value that pornography is destructive and not worth studying for credit?
There is lots of research on pornography. There are a ton of feminist researchers who believe pornography is destructive. I would think that an a priori belief that pornography iz bad would not be a very scientific, rational decision.
quote: The idea that having religious conviction does not automatically make you a kook.
You ought to mention this in the divinity department of some universites some time.
quote: The value that abstaining from sex until marriage is a choice to be honored and admired.
Lots of research out there that shows the negative consequences of people having children before they are ready. Taken in conjunction with your first point, there is lots of research out there that agrees with the idea that 'traditional' models of living are 'healthy'.
This is not to say that 'non-trational' modes of living are not healthy. Lots of research done there, and it's a matter of degree.
[ September 08, 2003, 05:01 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by monteverdi (Member # 2896) on :
actively scorned honestly debated
Far from either. Any U. that I'm familiar with (mainly Canada) is full of people from everywhere practicing everything - the student associations (christian, jewish, muslim, and others) all active and vocal - the biggest problem is 'respecting' the various communities in light of the mediatization of their various interactions
Nobody needs to learn anything anymore it turns out -
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:lots of research out there that agrees with the idea that 'traditional' models of living are 'healthy'.
This is not to say that 'non-trational' modes of living are not healthy.
Way to not take a stand there, Stormy. Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
quote: I think he's concerned with the way religions (specifically Christianity) are actively scorned on campuses.
I wish you would tell that to the Campus Crusade for Christ. I think it was they a few years a go that ran a full page ad in the student newspaper urging gay people to give up homosexuality and live for Jesus. There was a list of professors, a long list, who could be contacted if the students wanted to know more about Jesus.
[ September 08, 2003, 05:03 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Kat, what I mean to say is that one does not necessarily imply the other. It's a matter of degree. Lots of traditional marriages are miserable affairs where the person would be happier not being married, or dating someone of the opposite sex.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
By the way, the higher admission rate for women is something that I would be very interested in seeing the reasons why.
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
The reason that so many universities and "progressives" are perceived (whether rightly or wrongly) as so hostile toward "traditional" roles and values is that there was a time when deviating from those roles and values was simply not tolerated.
So have we gotten to the point where it is so acceptable for women to have careers, for all races to have equal rights, for homosexuals not to have to hide, for people to practice any or no religion, that these causes no longer need champions?
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote:Gender roles, where it is okay (and not considered a waste) for a woman to be highly educated, yet after graduation choose to be a stay at home mom.
The truly traditional gender roles considered it a waste for a woman to be highly educated, period.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Now, OSC specifically said that he wasn't arguing in favor of bigotry. So any traditional belief that resembles bigotry is clearly NOT what he was talking about. Got that? Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Destineer, that isn't true enough to leave as a blanket statement.
Brigham Young (way old, and squarely in the "traditional" camp) said if you could only educate one, it was better to educate the daughter than the son, and that all people were under obligation to get as much education as they possibly could.
Posted by Duragon C. Mikado (Member # 2815) on :
Its just a theory of mine, but I guess an easy explanation is that being a college professor takes a lot of analytical thought outside of spoon fed tradition and theological belief. This is probably the reason why OSC has this fear of the Evil College Professor Liberal Cabal that is set out to desensitize morality.
I don't think he should complain, religions have their prosthelitizers, rational thought should have some too.
[ September 08, 2003, 05:23 PM: Message edited by: Duragon C. Mikado ]
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Yeah, that's probably it. You know how much OSC hates it when people think.
Posted by Audeo (Member # 5130) on :
I was reading this essay in my dorm room when someone came up behind me to ask what it was about. I was about two-thirds of the way through the essay, so I gave a quick synopsis; "It's about how college professors are all liberals." His response was; "That doesn't sound like anything to write an essay about. It's just a statement of fact."
While I don't know exactly what OSC was intending in his essay, I can think of a few examples just from my experience. Professors express their views starting by choosing which texts you read in a class. Then in class discussions they guide the class discussions to fit their view point. Specifically I have heard professors actively campaigning for socialism, attempting to shame students for 'oppressing' people of other race, religion, or economic class based entirely of course on the student's own gender and race. They also advocate many politically leftist positions like supporting gun control and abortion. So even if OSC didn't point out all the specifics, anyone in college can tell you that when they call it a liberal arts education, the liberal doesn't really mean a broad education, but a politically liberal indoctrination. I for one appreciated his ending statement. Sometimes with leading questions and the materials professors give us to work with it is hard for students to make a case for a more conservative point of view. Particularly when at times conservative students are vastly out numbered.
Posted by Duragon C. Mikado (Member # 2815) on :
I would just like to say that I've seen plenty of professors who are die hard conservatives and don't mind expressing that. I had one professor who turned what should have been a US Foreign policy class into a day by day account of the Gulf War combat analysis. OSC is overstating and generalizing a problem.
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
I attended college for four years. For every liberally-minded professor I had a class with, there were an equal number of both conservatives and apoliticals.
kat, while we may look at Brigham Young as being "squarely in the 'traditional' camp" today, was he really viewed that way by the mainstream of his own time? (I have an idea of what I think the answer to that question is, but since I'm not that knowledgable, I really am interested to know.)
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Audeo, David Brock -- in his book Blinded by the Right -- speculated that the reason both he and Ann Coulter were so venomous about going after liberals once they got out of college was that they were so resentful of being "indoctrinated" while there. I think it's an interesting idea: that we might be creating little right-wing monsters as REACTIONARIES.
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
This viewpoint may have something to do with what OSC was talking about.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
saxy: Actually, probably not, because if it hadn't been necessary to say it, he probably wouldn't have. In other words, there's no need to state what everyone knows.
But it does mean that those who think OSC was calling for a return of the days of uneducated woman are missing the point.
It would be nice if he'd stuck some specific examples into his general column. It's a nice thought, but it leaves us guessing as to what he is talking about.
Posted by The Silverblue Sun (Member # 1630) on :
Maybe he's upset that colleges refuse to teach the Jesus turned water to non-alcoholic wine.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote:Brigham Young (way old, and squarely in the "traditional" camp) said if you could only educate one, it was better to educate the daughter than the son, and that all people were under obligation to get as much education as they possibly could.
It seems to me that Young was never a member of the traditional establishment. At the time he was alive, Mormonism was a dissenting, revolutionary denomination.
OSC seems to draw very little distinction between respecting a belief system and holding that that system is the only way to live. To him, those who believe that traditional ways are not the only acceptable ways have no respect for tradition, and those who have respect for secular and humanistic thought are automatically intolerant of religion.
I think that's mistaken.
Posted by Rohan (Member # 5141) on :
I'm sure if enough people chime in with their anecdotal evidence, we'll quickly come to a consensus about what's really going on. Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
kat, I wasn't trying to say that I think OSC wants women to be uneducated, or blacks to be slaves, or gays to be beaten. It's so completely and obviously not the case that it would be absurd for me to imply that.
My point is that I think OSC's position that foaming at the mouth liberalism has no place at all in schools is:
a.) alarmist, b.) inaccurate, and c.) only really true if equality and tolerance are so natural and acceptable that those causes no longer need anyone to stick up for them.
I took a course in school called "Anarchy and the Internet" wherein I was basically bombarded for a whole semester with anarchist propaganda. If anything, it only strengthened my belief that anarchism and communism are not the way to go. I really don't think any lasting damage is done by ultra-liberal (or ultra-conservative) professors. Adults (which we assume college students to be, legally anyway) are capable of making up their own minds.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Okay, next time OSC goes on a rant, I want specific examples of what he's talking about. It's hard to even debate the topic in terms of what he might or might not have meant.
Posted by The Silverblue Sun (Member # 1630) on :
So to fix it, only John Ashcroft, Donald Rumsfeld, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Dick Cheney, Pat Robertson and OSC should be allowed to teach at universitys.
Can we get a constitutional amendment to help us fix this problem?
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
quote: OSC seems to draw very little distinction between respecting a belief system and holding that that system is the only way to live. To him, those who believe that traditional ways are not the only acceptable ways have no respect for tradition, and those who have respect for secular and humanistic thought are automatically intolerant of religion.
Hmm. Perhaps a system that holds that it is the only way to live can only be respected by those who agree that it is the only way to live. Thoughts?
Posted by The Silverblue Sun (Member # 1630) on :
Who are the rappers OSC likes most?
Does he love N.W.A's straight out of compton? Or does he go for more of a sugary L.L. Cool J style? Or does he get mezmerized by the hard beats of DMX? Or is he stuck in the old school of the Sugar Hill Gang?
Posted by Bokonon (Member # 480) on :
Thor, while I can't speak for OSC, I have been known to get a quick fix from the early 90s Toronto hip-hop grooves of Dream Warriors
(Great White) North Side, representin'!
Ow, ow, I think I pulled something... That's the last time I work so hard to be a poser.
-Bok
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Okay so i've only started reading OSC's tirade, but the first thing that strikes me, is that i don't know why he'd be upset about the 65% female student body comment. The human race isn't divided up 50/50 if one was to bring up statistics, and there are plenty of other gender inequities out in the US, that an increase in female college attendees seems like a positive step to me as well... Besides, such a statistic doesn't take into account the age of the incoming cohort, or over all gender demographic in the area, or anything of that sort. It could easily be that they have the same proportion of 18-25 year olds gender-wise, plus a whole bunch of stay at home mothers who decided to go back and get a degree. Who knows? It just seems to be a silly thing to bring up without all the facts.
more later.
[ September 08, 2003, 08:13 PM: Message edited by: Pod ]
Posted by The Silverblue Sun (Member # 1630) on :
The thing that I find stupid amongst educated people is the demand that the smartest people get the best education.
That's dumb, really.
The smartest people will always find good education and will most likely be excellent at educating themselves, what we need is to educate all the uneducated people.
I never could understand the movement for "Keep all the dumb or mediocre kids out of college!"
The less dumb people on Earth the better, no?
<T>
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
quote:(It is apparently inconceivable that women might simply be allowed to freely choose what they're interested in studying.)
And as another point of note, since i happen to personally know girls who used to be interested in computer science, but who gave it up because they couldn't deal with being stepped upon constantly by the other male computer science majors, i can say that the quantity of girls who actually succeed in computer science and other "traditionally" male fields is still very much an issue.
[ September 08, 2003, 08:13 PM: Message edited by: Pod ]
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
That would also make it a silly thing to cheer about.
Do the numbers come from a higher porportion of women enrolling, or from a lower porportion of men enrolling?
If its the first, that means women who otherwise would not have gone to college are getting a message that men who otherwise would not have gone are not. Interesting, but not a crisis.
If the second, then there's a problem. Why are fewer men attending and graduating from college?
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
And really, of one wants to talk about gender discrimination, i think car insurance is really the biggest rip off. Universities at least look at each individual application. Insurance companies simply treat underage males as a demographic who will cost them more, regardless of the individual merits of such a claim.
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Kat:
Yes, but the point is that it's possible that that statistic is a good thing without meaning a bad thing for males. Statistically speaking, there is a gender inequality in terms of how much men earn over women. Thus the logic is, if the women are more educated than men, this gap to some degree may be closed.
I guess my point here is there is a logical and fairly straight forward reason why such an expression of satisfcation at a 65% female enrollment rate could be a good thing, while simultaniously not meaning a bad thing for the 15 percent of males who "fell between the cracks" or whatever OSC seems to think has happened to them.
What if the 15% are the salaried males who feel absolutely no compulsion to go back to school? One can make the same argument that he makes for letting girls study what they want to. It all seems topsy-turvy to me. The inconsistance is that he's worried about statistics for attendence to university in general, but that he thinks the demographics of specific colleges or departments within the unviersity is unimportant.
[ September 08, 2003, 08:14 PM: Message edited by: Pod ]
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:What if the 15% are the salaried males who feel absolutely no compulsion to go back to school?
Well, is education a good thing or not? Are there reasons for it other than to-get-a-job?
If there are, why wouldn't men need that just as badly as women?
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Okay here's really what this comes down to.
quote:Again, the very people I'm speaking of will be sure to call me a bigot and deny that there is any such bias -- and then return immediately to mocking or vilifying religion, sneering at the traditional family, and blaming America for most of the world's ills.
OSC doesn't make clear who "the very people [he's] speaking of" are. He seems to have attributed injustices of university politics to "the Established P.C. Church". The surreality of all of this is that he's yet to connect in any way shape or form how "bad science" (which there is alot of) connects to political correctness, except that anecdotally, the two may perhaps coincide in some individuals.
The vital thing to remember is that co-occurance, in no way shape or form imparts a causal relationship between one and the other. It's fully possible (even likely) that those who are trully of a radically politically correct mind-set might be dogmatic, irrational lunatics. But is that because of political correctness? I hardly think so, it seems primarily due to a dogmatic irrational personality.
I fully agree with OSC that dogmatism and irrationality in those who teach is the absolute worse quality we could possibly have in such a position. But this has nothing to do with political correctness, because political correctness does not foster irrationality, it's merely the fixation of the irrationality.
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Kat:
if those men have worked themselves into the institutional fabric, and feel that they have nothing to gain from going back to school, then why would they?
Is education a good thing? I would say yes for a number of reasons.
From an economic perspective however, school is for making oneself more imployable. If one is trying to maximize the rate at which one amasses wealth (which not all people are after, but grant me this), the economics of the situation are thus:
One must concider the cost of what one sacrifices in order to perform another task. Thus, a male who wont' make an appreciable raise from going back to school, probably shouldn't bother, because of the money he's not making, while he's away from the job at school. A woman however who would see a relatively large salary increase (i'm just making this up for the sake of demonstration) might find it worth her while to take that immediate hit to her finances (that is she's not making money working) to get another degree because once she does she'll be able to not only to recoupe what she would have made in those years where she was attending school, but also gain more money in following years.
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Ah-Hah!
this OSC and i agree on ultimately:
quote:Meanwhile, as you send your kids off to college -- and as you help them prepare for college through their primary and secondary education at home -- remember that if you want them to remain true to the beliefs you raised them with, the best method is to encourage them to be rigorously skeptical.
My added caveat is that one should be similarly skeptical to anti-collegiate newspaper columns, the campus crusade for christ and other similarly reactionary right wing campus institutions.
quote:The students who are most at the mercy of politically correct propaganda in the university are the young people who have been trained not to think for themselves and to believe everything that authority figures have taught them. It's a piece of cake for experienced faculty members to leave their previously unquestioned beliefs in tatters.
So tell me, which political wing was attempting to legislate out evolution? Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
And thus, once again, i have found myself agreeing in the method that OSC espouses, but disagreeing with nearly each example he has given.
Since i have never understood how this man gets from his examples to his conclusions, i guess the best i can do is shrug my shoulders and go "oh well", this time, his ultimate conclusion i can agree with, regardless of his (perhaps dogmatic ) politically-biased entanglement of unrelated portions of academic politics.
[ September 08, 2003, 07:42 PM: Message edited by: Pod ]
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
His articles are frustrating me. I want to sit with him, drink chocolate milk and pick his brain and ask him just what he means The right does the exact thing in a lot of cases...
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
So, why don't we ask OSC what he means? I mean, we could just invite him to come read this Posted by blacwolve (Member # 2972) on :
Go ahead.
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
You may not want to do that if you disagree with him ... I've never seen him lose an argument in person
I think that the reason Card does not define his terms very often is because these articles are part of an extended personal dialogue he's been maintaining against a certain brand of liberal intellectual since the mid-seventies. He's been arguing against the same people, attitudes, and practices for so long that it would be incredibly boring and monotonous for him to repeat his definitions again and again ...
Pod, most of your little snippy comments seem to assume that Card is a right-wing nut like Rush Limbaugh, and that by pointing out the culpability of far-rightists, you're somehow affecting Card's argument. To my knowledge, Card has never been against the teaching of evolution in school, has always been against mandatory prayer, has always been in favor of gun control and against excessive free-market capitalism ... he is far from being a right-winger.
It just happens that the issues closest to his heart, over which he has come into the most conflict with the people closest to him in his own industry, are issues over which he disagrees with mindless leftist idealogues. This doesn't makes him the right-wing whipping boy, so you and every newbie who comes to this forum on a weekly basis with zero knowledge of Card's political leanings and a huge liberal chip on their shoulder can cut it out. Sheesh, I'm sick of hearing it, it's really really old.
Sorry you ended up the focus of this, Pod. You're far from being the worst about this stuff, you're just the one that got to me today And I do think it's cool that you agree with him on teaching children skepticism. I guess his theory is that if your beliefs are true, then teaching your children rigor and skepticism will make them mroe likely to agree with you. If they're NOT true, then your kids are better off not following in your footsteps.
We all seem to have such presumption, though, assuming that our beliefs are so right that if anyone disagrees, they must have been brainwashed by the other side, and true freethinkers will always agree with "us" That applies to Card, sure, but it applies just as well to his opponents. Card, at least, had the guts to teach his kids to question his beliefs. As a result, we disagree with him more than he'd probably like. But we also see the value in his ideals for their own merits, and not just by default because we were raised with them.
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Oh then i should add a big caveat.
Don't get me wrong, i've talked to your Dad Geoff, i don't think he's a right wing nut.
As i have indicated, i agree with him on the subject in general, what bewilders me is that the problem that his column addresses doesn't seem to me to be a problem with left-wing ideology, it seems to me to be a problem with dogmatism.
Thus, all i sought to do was to point out that there were right-wing correlaries to the left-wing examples.
I in no way shape or form think that OSC is a right-wing whipping boy.
(perhaps i should go back and edit a few things then )
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
He sure does sharpen my sword.. Which is all the more reason why I'd like to pick his brain because I can't understand left or right or political correctness except in the sense that I lean more towards the left than the right.
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Geoff:
One thing, that should be "effect" not "affect" (i only point this out because the two mean different things but play similar grammatical roles, so when it typically throws me for a loop when people say "affect" instead of "effect" such that i have a hard time understand the sentence)
The repition of basic tenants of what one is arguing about is something that TomD has brought up recently as well. My own issue is that though i've been on hatrack for almost 3 years, i've yet to ever encounter your father's definitions of liberal political correctness. Thus, i have been left rather bewildered, and i think his point is then lost on its logical merits, and is relegated to being partisan.
So once again, i have found myself agreeing with some general conceptual arguments that OSC writes (like teaching skepticism), however his more recent arguments (and this one seems to me in the same vein) partisan enough to detract from his overall message.
Thus, i agree, i just don't think he offers a balanced opinion, and i just wish he would! (but then again i suppose none of us really do)
[ September 08, 2003, 08:11 PM: Message edited by: Pod ]
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
and this is an excerpt from what i sent mr. card:
My general question (which I also bring up in the thread) is this:
You’ve mentioned that there is a lot of politicking and irrationality in the places which are supposed to regard rationality most highly (I agree whole-heartedly), however I’m curious in what manner you regard political correctness as the source of irrationality in academic politics. (this is a question of current relevance to me, as I am a university student who might soon be looking at graduate schools)
Ultimately, I agree with your conclusions, that a solid skepticism is a necessary part of all people’s educations, as well as the necessity of critical thinking as the core of any education. My point I suppose is simply that addressing “political correctness” (and I think you and I may have disagreements on what exactly that is) does little to address the root of problems in the academic community. Political inquisitions which are unfortunately pandemic in American institutions are ultimately recurring fads, ones in which the content of the inquisition is merely symptomatic of the main problem.
(So if OSC doesn't reply, maybe someone else will)
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
I think we must be misreading one another, Pod, because I'm pretty darn sure I was using the word "affect" correctly.
I was saying that I didn't think comments lampooning right-wing idealogies could really "affect" Card's argument. Ie, they could not have much impact on what he was saying, since he doesn't personally espouse most of the right-wing ideals you cited. Am I reading the correct sentence?
In any case, since we're being really picky, a "tenet" is an element of a belief system, and a "tenant" is a person living in a rented space Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Oh, but anyway, your explanation is well-taken, and I am officially aiming my criticism-beam in another direction I'll wait till another crazy liberal newbie shows up to turn it on someone again ...
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
So, old liberals are free from your wrath? Sweet!
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote:To my knowledge, Card has never been against the teaching of evolution in school, has always been against mandatory prayer, has always been in favor of gun control and against excessive free-market capitalism ... he is far from being a right-winger.
But he is in favor of mandatory heterosexuality. That is a really, really big issue for some people. It's one thing to be against gay marriage; I can understand the impetus behind preserving the public trappings of family tradition, although I don't agree. But supporting actual laws against sodomy is a very staunchly conservative position -- I can count on my fingers the number of people who've told me they believe in sodomy laws, and I grew up in small-town northern Michigan.
The best characterization of OSC is neither right nor left, but all over the place. Thus while he is by no means a classic conservative, some of his beliefs are just anathema to liberals. I don't mean the belief that gayness is wrong; who cares about that? I mean the belief that it shouldn't be permitted.
And really, he never talks about gun control or economics. I guess you've explained why. But nonetheless, it is hard to take it to heart that he's not so conservative when he never takes time to express the non-conservative opinions he does have.
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
He actually has done a couple of recent articles addressing crazy free-market economists. Oddly, enough, no one complained about them
And correct me if I'm wrong, but I've never seen Card advocating sodomy laws or saying that homosexuality should be illegal, or that heterosexuality ought to be enforced. That's a bizarrely extreme position that I think would probably freak him out. His essays, thus far, have spoken out against wholesale acceptance of the gay lifestyle as an endorsed part of American society. But I've never heard him even imply that gays ought to be prosecuted. Where did you get that impression?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I don't have time to find it right now (ah, tech support), but I remember a recent essay advocating that anti-homosexuality laws remain on the books so that they can be selectively enforced.
Also, while I haven't started any threads on it (mainly as I rarely start threads), I'd like to remark that I find OSC's economic views ridiculous . He attacks the free market for things that are the fault of restrictive policies, not free market policies, then advocates more restrictive policies.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Uh...call me crazy, but wasn't his position in his infamous gay piece that sodomy laws should be randomly enforced and that gay people were bad for families or something?
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Also, Geoff, if you don't want people to paint your dad with a broad brush, why do you think it's fair that he paints certain groups with broad brushes? He uses words like 'elites' and 'intelligentsia' and 'pro-American' and 'anti-family' quite often.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote:Laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books, not to be indiscriminately enforced against anyone who happens to be caught violating them, but to be used when necessary to send a clear message that those who flagrantly violate society's regulation of sexual behavior cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.
Whatever you may think of that, it's not a moderate view.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
quote: This applies also to the polity, the citizens at large. Laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books, not to be indiscriminately enforced against anyone who happens to be caught violating them, but to be used when necessary to send a clear message that those who flagrantly violate society's regulation of sexual behavior cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.
The goal of the polity is not to put homosexuals in jail. The goal is to discourage people from engaging in homosexual practices in the first place, and, when they nevertheless proceed in their homosexual behavior, to encourage them to do so discreetly, so as not to shake the confidence of the community in the polity's ability to provide rules for safe, stable, dependable marriage and family relationships.
Those who would be members of a community must sacrifice the satisfaction of some of their individual desires in order to maintain the existence of that community. They must, in other words, obey the rules that define what that community is. Those who are not willing or able to obey the rules should honestly admit the fact and withdraw from membership.
quote:
Furthermore, if we allow ourselves to be intimidated by our fear of the world's censure into silence in the face of attempts by homosexuals to make their sin acceptable under the laws of the polity, then we have abandoned our role as teachers of righteousness.
Which I take to mean that good Mormons must always work to make sure homosexuality is unacceptable and that, therefore, only heterosexuality is acceptable.
[ September 08, 2003, 09:50 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
I completely disagree with that as that sort of attitude leads to a lot of pain for a lot of people.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
Hey Stormy -- jinx!
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
I've been doing it a lot lately. I guess I just got a bit of what we call 'the shine' in these parts.
*puffs on corncob pipe contentedly*
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
I would hardly call "Hypocrites of Homosexuality" a recent article Thirteen years is a pretty long time to have to look back to find a quote. But I suppose I'm basing my evaluation of his opinions on anecdotal experiences, rather than the written word ...
Either way, though, I don't get the impression that he's in favor of "random arrests" or the systematic persecution of gays. It looks like he's more concerned that if we start the wholesale stripping of sexual laws from the books, we'll soon have no basis for prosecuting people who use sex as a tool to do real harm. I mean, isn't that what the article SAYS? Are we to assume through the use of our mind-reading abilities that Card "really intends" to do more with these laws that he explicitly states? Whether or not leaving the laws on the books as they are is the right way to handle the situation is a different matter, but you're taking his statement a bit too far.
And by the way, it's fair to point out that the article in question was written for the Mormon audience, an audience which shares a common belief that homosexual practice is a violation of a shared code of ethics. Criticizing gays within the Mormon community can involve a different tone than criticism aimed outwards without being too extreme.
Storm, I think there is a huge difference between lumping an individual in with a group they don't belong to, and criticizing a large group of people for opinions and practices which are common, yet not universal, among that group. I mean, what is Card supposed to do, cite the name of each individual person he sees as a member of the group he is talking about? Or can we allow a little leeway, and assume that when he criticizes intellectuals for indoctrinating our youth with liberal propaganda, he is speaking specifically of "intellectuals who indoctrinate our youth with liberal propaganda", and is not referring to intellectuals who don't?
[ September 08, 2003, 10:31 PM: Message edited by: Geoffrey Card ]
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
If OSC won't answer, will someone let me know what "anti-family" is and why it is that liberals are said to be that? And not only that, but in the case of OSC's article, they "sneer" too!
fil
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Look at the "Is marriage a prison?" thread. Read Duragon's posts. That's anti-family.
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
It doesn't need to be a recent article when OSC is defended as not needing to define terms that he has argued "since the 70's." If he hasn't changed his tune since then, then something a mere 13 years ago is par for what we can expect on his views.
Just a thought.
fil
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Oh come now, you're not seriously trying to throw those words back in my face, are you? I didn't say his OPINIONS haven't changed since the seventies. I said he's been arguing with the same PEOPLE since the seventies. Two very different things.
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
How is questioning (or, being skeptical? ) about the legal institution of marriage "anti-family?" At best, he is "anti-marriage" and what with a nearly 1 in 2 marriages dissolving, so would half of our nation. But a divorced couple with kids is still a family, albeit one with different hurdles than one with only one parent or one with both parents living in the home or one with both living in the home but hating each other, etc. So, I still don't see it as "anti-family." I guess more importantly we need to then get to the definition of "family." To know this, we would better know what the opposite is. Being skeptical about marriage (skeptics being a trait adored by OSC, apparently...just maybe not in this case?) as anti-family? Would the opposite (not being skeptical about "family" or taking it as wrote that there is only one definition of family) be pro-family? Just curious. Maybe stick with a workable definition of "family."
fil
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"Or can we allow a little leeway, and assume that when he criticizes intellectuals for indoctrinating our youth with liberal propaganda, he is speaking specifically of 'intellectuals who indoctrinate our youth with liberal propaganda,' and is not referring to intellectuals who don't?"
Geoff, people -- including your father -- paint issues with a broad brush because it's easier, and because it enables them to make what they believe is a convenient generalization. However, by doing so, they run into the DOWNSIDE of using a broad brush: slopping crap everywhere.
Your father isn't just criticizing a handful of specific individuals; he's critiquing an entire culture, and indirectly those people who would more broadly sympathize with it. In so doing, he basically makes it impossible to identify or respect his SPECIFIC targets, since he doesn't actually restrict his comments to those targets.
That's actually the post of this thread; I had trouble figuring out who those targets were, and hoped the answer wouldn't be painfully inexact. You make the point that your dad's been "arguing with the same people" for decades -- but he doesn't actually identify these people, and we're left to assume that it's a whole CLASS of people who rub him the wrong way. (And I'm assuming that's the case, to be honest.) But if that IS the case, then he's trying to snipe with a shotgun.
[ September 08, 2003, 10:44 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
Not throwing at all! If he is arguing against the same people since the 70's, are all of their views on life changing at the same rate? I guess my point is, he doesn't want to take the time to redefine arguments he has had for 30 odd years which means they probably haven't changed much. Otherwise, why argue with the same people? Or are they just argumentative and just argue for the sake of arguing?
The point being, he is painted as a fairly right conservative because he is using catch phrases that the Right uses frequently and minus any definitions to the contrary, they paint a pretty right picture. What is wrong with him being a conservative? Or Right?
fil
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Speaking of mind reading, Geoff. He specifically says the things that I quoted him as saying.
quote: Either way, though, I don't get the impression that he's in favor of "random arrests" or the systematic persecution of gays.
quote: Laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books
and
quote:
The goal is to discourage people from engaging in homosexual practices in the first place
Seems pretty specific to me. And, yes, these laws are a part of the whole subset of those laws which society uses to regulate sexual behavior, but Geoff, why do you think you can't 'legalize' homosexuality and keep other 'bad' stuff illegal? You've just redefined what's bad. That's all. You haven't said that there's no such thing as bad sexual behavior and to say so with regards to the legalization of homosexuality is absolutely a use of slippery slope.
I am curious as to why you think that given these statements and the subject of the article that his main purpose was to defend society's ability to regulate sexual behavior?
quote: Whether or not leaving the laws on the books as they are is the right way to handle the situation is a different matter, but you're taking his statement a bit too far.
I respectfully disagree. I think I am reading exactly what he wrote.
[ September 08, 2003, 10:58 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
::sighs::
well i guess we probably won't get a reply from OSC.
Thanks for at least some perspective Geoff.
If you could do me a favor and ask him to write a column on who he means when he talks about politically correct liberals, and if he might think about their right wing counterparts some time?
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
fil, you're getting silly now.
Tom, all we're noticing is the fact that it's difficult to discuss and criticize large groups of people because any label you use to identify them is going to piss someone off. Yeah, that's true. I'm defending Card for doing it because it's a difficult problem to avoid, no matter how careful you are, when you're trying to fight against an informal trend (such as dogmatic liberalism among the intelligentsia of America). He's been fighting against this trend for years, and his opponents have never been kind enough to post a membership roster or give themselves a formal name and a list of agreed-upon doctrines. So what is he supposed to do? Seriously.
If you deny that there is a trend among the intelligentsia of America to spread liberal dogma, then you have an argument with him. That's cool. But there is nothing wrong with him pointing the trend out as he sees it.
Storm, you're starting to argue with me as though I wrote the article. I didn't. I'm defending Card because he isn't as extreme as you're painting him, and I think it's unfair for you to set up and knock down a straw man argument like this. Yes, Card is in favor of society establishing legally-enforceable sexual rules. I think everyone here agrees that, for instance, sexual interaction with prepubescent children should be against the law, while consensual sex between heterosexual couples should be perfectly legal. Somewhere in between, there is a line, which many of us disagree about.
Card's position, upon writing that article, appears, from the text, to say that homosexual practice should remain illegal wherever there are already sodomy laws, but that it should be treated with salutory neglect. In other words, leave the laws on the books as a hedge against society's mores slipping, or to avoid tacit endorsement of homosexuality, but don't actually arrest anyone for breaking them. Essentially, he seems to be in favor of the exact system America has been following (with a few blips) for decades. I don't see what is so controversial about this position.
His position that homosexual practice is a sin might be controversial, but that was stated in the context of an article written for the Mormon audience, so you have to take it with a grain of salt.
Now, I personally disagree with the legal element of the article. I think that stupid, unenforceable laws should be removed from the books, and I certainly do not believe that anyone should be arrested for private sexual behavior between consenting adults.
So I'm not trying to tell you his position is right. I'm just telling you that his position is not nearly as extreme as you'd like it to be.
[ September 08, 2003, 11:20 PM: Message edited by: Geoffrey Card ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
quote: hypocrites of homosexuality
By the way, the use of this phrase is exactly indicative of the kind of language that OSC uses when he discusses almost any group that disagrees with him. If there is hypocrisy in a group's view point, then point it out and move on. To use it to define the group is obviously meant to prejudice the reader towards that group and shows a lack of respect towards that group. If I were to do it here on the board, to call those who are for keeping homosexuality illegal as 'hypocrites of morality', or 'moral elites' or the 'moralgentsia' or somesuch, I would rightfully have my throat jumped down.
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Note that the title is NOT "Gay people are hypocrites." Card's title refers to the main thesis of his article — that it is hypocritical for Mormons to endorse homosexual practice. It's not an unreasonable position, and the phrase "Hypocrites of Homosexuality" is a succinct way to describe the subject. It also attracts attention to the article, which is the point of a title in the first place. In and of itself, it says nothing offensive about gays. Come on, let's see if we can be a bit more picky.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Huh? What straw man argument am I setting up? You mean me arguing with you as if you wrote the article? How is that a straw man? You're right. You didn't write it. I was responding to
quote: Either way, though, I don't get the impression that he's in favor of "random arrests" or the systematic persecution of gays. It looks like he's more concerned that if we start the wholesale stripping of sexual laws from the books, we'll soon have no basis for prosecuting people who use sex as a tool to do real harm.
I guess I did start writing to you as if you wrote it. Then again, you're defending it, and you do bear a striking resemblance. But where is the straw man? I have given quotes of what I was basing my statements off of. If I have misunderstood, that is one thing, but I don't think it is fair to say that I am intentionally making a straw man.
quote:
Card's position, upon writing that article, appears, from the text, to say that homosexual practice should remain illegal wherever there are already sodomy laws, but that it should be treated with salutory neglect. In other words, leave the laws on the books as a hedge against society's mores slipping, or to avoid tacit endorsement of homosexuality, but don't actually arrest anyone for breaking them. Essentially, he seems to be in favor of the exact system America has been following (with a few blips) for decades. I don't see what is so controversial about this position.
quote: This applies also to the polity, the citizens at large. Laws against homosexual behavior should remain on the books, not to be indiscriminately enforced against anyone who happens to be caught violating them, but to be used when necessary to send a clear message that those who flagrantly violate society's regulation of sexual behavior cannot be permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.
The key phrase appears to be 'permitted to remain as acceptable, equal citizens within that society.' I hope you can see how that can be interpreted to mean exactly what it says--that the laws should be used to not allow people to be equal citizens. Could be jail. Could be censure. But it's not clear, is it?
[ September 08, 2003, 11:51 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Well. Huh. Sorry, Geoff. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. Sorry.
Edit: On rereading what you wrote, I'm going to go ahead and respond in more detail.
quote: Note that the title is NOT "Gay people are hypocrites."
O.K. I didn't say he was calling gay people hypocrites.
quote:
Card's title refers to the main thesis of his article — that it is hypocritical for Mormons to endorse homosexual practice.
Fine.
quote: It's not an unreasonable position, and the phrase "Hypocrites of Homosexuality" is a succinct way to describe the subject.
And you don't see how that title might be seen as a little, uh, emotion laden? And that it's use throughout the article to refer to that group might not be seen as a way to paint them in as negative a light as possible? Again, to go back to posts on this board, if I refer to people as 'you Mormon hypocrites' or 'you Christian hypocrites', you don't see how that would prejudice people against what I had to say? Do you really not see that, Geoff?
quote: It also attracts attention to the article, which is the point of a title in the first place.
True. I would say that it attracts the wrong kind of attention to the article and makes the reader think right off the bat that OSC is not going to handle the subject fairly.
quote: In and of itself, it says nothing offensive about gays. Come on, let's see if we can be a bit more picky.
I never said that it did say anything offensive about gays.
[ September 08, 2003, 11:49 PM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
fil, we agree that liberals are almost universally pro-abortion, right? I'd have to say that fundamentally the belief that abortion is okay is pretty darned anti-family.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote: . . . "anti-marriage" and what with a nearly 1 in 2 marriages dissolving, so would half of our nation.
Wow, that's quite an assumption! Not every person who gets divorced is "anti-marriage"!
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
No, liberals are not universally 'pro-abortion', whatever the heck that means. God bless, man. Am I the only one who has been speaking to people on the opposite side of the aisle on this board while I've been here? Jebus. Tom, Mack, Kayla, and dkw are all fairly fiscally liberal in one way or another but they aren't 'for' abortion and I doubt you could potray them as anti-family. Most social liberals, like myself, would just as soon hedge their bets and not see any abortions at all. I've said that while I support counselling before abortions and every opportunity to carry the blip to term and give it up for adoption, I'm not for making abortions illegal, and I'm certainly not 'anti-family'.
[ September 09, 2003, 12:02 AM: Message edited by: Storm Saxon ]
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
jeniwren, I find myself agreeing with what you say more often than not. This time, however, is definitely a not.
First of all,
quote: we agree that liberals are almost universally pro-abortion
I suppose that depends how you define "liberal." I consider myself a liberal, for the most part. And while I am not in favor of abortion, generally speaking, I find the idea of the government making that decision abhorrent. And not every person who chooses abortion is "anti-family"!
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
While many liberals are pro choice, almost none are pro abortion (in the sense of they would advocate it as a choice for someone), and the number who are pro choice I would guesstimate at a 70-30 majority.
This point has been repeatedly mentioned in every abortion thread hatrack has ever had while I have been here.
Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
The sixty-five percent number could be for a myriad of reasons, men going to trade schools or the military, those are the first two that come to my mind, and I know those are significant percentages in other parts of the country.
quote:Well, is education a good thing or not? Are there reasons for it other than to-get-a-job?
Yes, but somehow we have forgotten that, or perhaps never truly learned, and I don't think that traditional society, at least exemplified by our commander-and-chief or any economy first public officials have been leading the way.
quote:Brigham Young (way old, and squarely in the "traditional" camp) said if you could only educate one, it was better to educate the daughter than the son, and that all people were under obligation to get as much education as they possibly could.
That's a great quote to trot out, but I kind of take issue, and I think that all fathers should, with the insinuation that fathers are okay to take a back seat in child rearing, and I still don't know how much it's put into practice.
Educating women is great. It fixes just about every problem in modern society, and I don't mean a token education and diaper changing classes, I'm talking about a rigorous and classical education about life and civic virtue. But here is a scenario, I'm just saying it could happen, not that I think that that this scenario is a virulent plague: We educate women in virtue, and men in the technical stuff-- moving rocks, paving roads, and designing computers-- it's a division of labor which is as American as the Model T, then we put men in prominent public positions and ones of authority and respect, then that's how we get our priorites mixed up because have The First Lady telling kids to read Dickens while the President brags about making "C"s at Yale. Studying latin becomes women's work while men speak roughly or grunt, relegating the decisive political power of language as a project to be debated by sissies, art and literature start becoming less important, submerged under economic success and efficiency, and sooner or later, people forget why they subsidize public schools to begin with. I'm going to digress:
When the framer's of California's constitution wrote that students wouldn't pay tuition at the colleges and universities, they weren't swept up by a capricious fancy, they were making a profound statement about democracy. I think we forget that. I'm waiting for President Bush to articulate a national purpose which trancends safety or even economic success. I want him to speak with the same confidence and knowledge in his educational plan that he does with his military endeavors.
*sigh* We are talking about putting up a democracies around the world, I think the Jesuits-- and I know that there are a lot of atrocities which fall on that Order of the Church-- but they set their priorites right and set up schools, leaving a legacy of education which has changed the world over, for the better, mind you. You can't talk about democracy without speaking about public education as an antecedent. We have forgotten this. The framers of the California Constitution knew, but we have forgotten.
_________
quote:I'd have to say that fundamentally the belief that abortion is okay is pretty darned anti-family.
It's because I'm pro-family that I'm pro-choice.
I think it's no small matter of importance that parents should [i]want[/i to raise the children before they have them.
[ September 09, 2003, 02:18 AM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
quote:But here is a scenario, I'm just saying it could happen, not that I think that that this scenario is a virulent plague: We educate women in the virtue, and men in the technical stuff-- moving rocks, paving roads, and designing computers-- it's a division of labor which as American as the Model T, then we put men in prominent public positions and ones of authority and respect, then that's how we get our priorites mixed up because have The First Lady telling kids to read Dickens while the President brags about making "C"s at Yale. Studying latin becomes woman's work while men speak roughly or grunt, relegating the decisive political power of language as a project to be debated by sissies, art and literature start becoming less important than economic success and efficiency, and sooner or later, people forget why they subsidize public schools to begin with.
i'm going to presume that the bolded statement is facetious.
Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
It's just a trend I see. It's one of many competing trends, but I think it's something that should be brought forth and discussed.
I do like how OSC counsels parents to teach their children to think rigorously, but I don't know. We both share the same faith that if everyone thought as well as they could, they'd agree with us. Apparently, the PC schools chastize students for thinking for themselves as much as conservative parents do, but I just don't think that bible burning is going to be something that is ever lauded by American intelligensia, then again, it's funny because as I get older, I just turned twenty-six, I'm starting to teach more and soon enough I'm going to be one of those liberal teachers who believe that America can do better once we examine our priorites, but maybe it's because I'm so brainwashed. If that's the reason I'm misguided, I just can't take Card's condemnations seriously.
[ September 09, 2003, 11:04 AM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
Well i'm questioning the bolded statement, because by and large, the majority of that is already true.
What i will disagree with is the characterization of the entire population of males as non-intellectuals. What we do see however is no appreciation for public schooling, religation of the liberal arts to nooks and crannies of universities, and a president who says "yes and you too can get straight 'C's and become president of the united states"
What i do disagree with this passage on, is that there will never be a complete polarization of gender in any intellectual field for a number of reasons.
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
jeni,
I try very hard to avoid making statements that will offend or alienate other people on this board simply because they maintain opposing philosophies from me. If you have noticed or appreciated that courtesy, or care about my feelings, I would ask that you try to do the same.
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
Eh, saxon, what have I written to you specifically that was intentionally offensive?
I'll have to assume that you're referring to my last post. To be very honest, that last post was something of a throwaway. So I'll apologize right at the outset to anyone who was offended. It was intentionally offensive, which is not really like me. I'm truly sorry.
While I meant it in basic philosophy (I believe -- and hate using the word believe, as if it were some sort of religious faith -- that abortion is killing a baby, which does mean that it is inherently anti-family) I don't honestly believe that liberals in general think that having abortions is better than having babies. I think that there *are* some liberals who believe that, but I think that they are the fringe element that most people would consider kooky.
Please accept my apologies.
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
"I guess I did start writing to you as if you wrote it. Then again, you're defending it, and you do bear a striking resemblance."
Heh heh Storm, I suppose I'm too good at putting myself in other people's shoes. I can defend someone's right to make an argument and have it understood fairly without making it clear whether and how I disagree with their opinion
That last quote you cited, about being free and equal members of society ... I missed it before, and I don't really have a way to defend it, beyond saying that this is not the attitude I've seen Card express in his day-to-day life. I'm kinda forced to see it as hyperbole, or part of a tendency to overstate his opinions. But, well, it's kinda there in black and white. I think he is the only one who can explain it
As far as the title thing goes, I only flipped out about it because it seemed to be such a picky thing. I mean, if there were an article called "Hypocrites of Mormonism", written by a born-again Christian, which skewers Christians for joining the "heretical" Mormon faith, I would take issue with the content of the essay long before I would even think of going after the title. Plus, I had just read two really ridiculous posts by fil, so my dander was up
In any case, let's not throw around frowny faces and get all misty-eyed because we can't come to an agreement. I think we disagree because we've come to understand Card from two totally different perspectives, and he has affected [take note, Pod, that this is a proper use of the word "affect"] us both in different ways. I know that in person, he is far more tolerant and open-minded than he sometimes appears in print, and I believe that that affects [ahem] the way I read his work. I can understand how someone less familiar with his personality could draw far more negative conclusions.
So. In case you were wondering, I may look like my father, and share his religious persuasion, but I'm not the same guy, and would not have written the same essay I just think he deserves a chance to speak his opinion without having words put in his mouth. "Random arrests", etc, take it too far. As you pointed out, the essay is sufficiently controversial on its face not to need any embellishment.
And Pod, what's wrong with making straight C's and being successful? That's what I plan to do Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
O.K. I enjoyed discussing it with you. I get a little excited when I post, as well, and I'm sure I didn't say things as well as I might have. In particular, I probably goofed when I said that the, ah, treatment of homosexuals was his 'main' point. On review, I think you are right in that, from his perspective, it is a matter of community integrity. It's probably one of those half full, half empty kind of things.
I am going to make another thread about the nauvoo article, perhaps, because he expresses a sentiment in there about homosexuality that I want to explore further. I kind of thought I might be working up to it in my 'reason in Christianity' thread, but I wasn't sure how to say it without sounding like a jerk. His article is a good excuse to throw it out there and see what people think.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
And yes, I realize you're your own man. I have never had an occasion to think otherwise. I know it's a sore subject with you.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
Yeah, thanks for sharing in the dialog, Geoff. Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
quote:And Pod, what's wrong with making straight C's and being successful?
The problem is bragging about just getting by. I'm one of those guys who believes that for the most part, people who get higher grades probably learned the material better and took the classes more seriously. The President should be more remorseful about fumbling his through college, and if that's your plan, so should you.
_______
I've received more than my share of "C"s and have hacked my way through entirely too many classes, from kindergarten through college, but I'm not proud my effort. I am the worse for it. I was irresponsible with my opportunities at every level, and I'm trying to the best of my ability to arrest that behavior.
That's the lesson that I think is important enough to live by and teach to others, and that's the lesson that Bush so brazenly flouted by joking about his time at Yale.
[ September 09, 2003, 10:52 AM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
jeniwren, the "pro-abortion" is another part of the post that was offensive. I also, try to use terms groups themselves endorse. Like saying LDS instead of Mormon. Or writing God, instead of god. I know we had another thread about the difference between pro-choice and pro-abortion. Are you still trying to be offensive to people who don't agree with you?
quote: that abortion is killing a baby, which does mean that it is inherently anti-family
So, a 14 year-old should have a baby? That is "pro-family?" A 17 year-old should have a baby she can't afford, nor will be able to provide for, other than at a very low economic level? A 20 year old in an abusive relationship who is halfway through college? If they choose to have an abortion, this makes them "anti-family?" What if later in life, they each had a half dozen happy, well-adjusted kids? Would they still be "anti-family?"
From my perspective, you aren't pro-family. Your are actually "anti-family" and "pro-suffer the consqences of your own stupid actions, you moron." If you were pro-family, you wouldn't want teens making bad choices, like entering into a poorly thought out marriage in order to raise an unplanned, and possibly unwanted child, who will, by some, been seen as a burden and the fault of all lifes bitter disappointments. Cause that senario right there, is a recipe for an alcoholic husband, an angry, bitter wife and neglected and abused kid. Not really much of a family.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Er...why is calling LDS 'Mormons' offensive? I'm not arguing with you. I just wasn't aware.
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
SS- it isn't offensive. The presidency of the church asked that journalists refer to the church by its full name rather than as "Mormons". Probably just to emphasize that we are Christians (a fact many seem to overlook).
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Since I realize you guys are Christians, I hope you don't mind if I say 'Mormons'. LDS sounds like a corporate entity or something, and I ain't typing the full name of the church out whenever I'm posting to or about Mormons. Sorry. My fingers would soon fall off. Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Man Tom D. You sure know how to start threads that take on a life of their own. Is is some ancient Jatraquero trick that the rest of us just haven't caught onto yet?
AJ
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Go ahead and call us Mormons, Storm. Now and then, you'll find a silly Mormon who likes to correct people who use the word, but the rest of us all use that word to describe ourselves more often than anything else.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
quote: Study: Jilted birds land in bad homes From Ann Kellan CNN Sci-Tech Unit Tuesday, September 9, 2003 Posted: 9:43 AM EDT (1343 GMT)
Oystercatchers have a divorce rate around 8 percent.
(CNN) -- Shorebirds known as oystercatchers may provide evidence not only that birds, like people, get "divorced," but that those getting dumped are more likely to land in a shoddier home in a more dangerous neighborhood.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
I just ran across one of OSC's previous articles, where he seems to define the "establishment" a bit better and basically be making the same point, though with a slightly different spin.
The problem with this essay is that it is a rant, not a pursuasive, reasoned analysis. It's filled with hyperbole, straw men, red herrings, and emotionalism. After having read similar essays by Card over the years, I've come to the conclusions that this is a highly personal issue for him. It strikes too close to home and he has been fighting against it for too long to be able maintain the objectivity needed to write a clear pursuasive essay about it. I suspect that he and his works have been denegrated by some of the Ivory Tower elite specifically because of his family and religious values. I have observed the biases he speaks of to be particularly egrigious in the performing arts community where affectations of melancholy are commonly mistaken for depth and anything pretty or with a tint of happiness is denounced as trite.
I can understand why, given his background, he feels the way he does. Unfortunately, he paints with too broad a brush and in doing so he alienates many, like myself, who should be his natural constinuency. The emotionalism in his essays harms his cause. In this essay for example, his central point is that parents need to teach their children critical thinking. Unfortunately, his point is nearly lost in the paragraphs of ranting about the evils of the educational establishment. Notice how few of the posts here even mention his conclusion.
As a university professor, I can assure that this is a point that nearly all faculty would support. This is a frequently discussed issue in faculty meetings and workshops. There is concern with the generally low level of critical thinking typical in students (and the general population), a recognition that we do a particularly poor job at the undergraduate level of teaching critical thinking and a concerted effort to find better ways to teach students to question authority, assess data and make reasoned decisions based on analysis of data. Although I am sure there are exceptions, all of the faculty members I know well are delighted when a student presents a well reasoned argument that challenges accepted theories. Unfortunately, it is far more common for students to rant than reason. By couching his thesis in the context of a rant, Card risks being equated to the students who are incapable of reasoned criticism. He virtually ensures that his thesis will be dismissed by those who ought to embrace it.
Card needs to step back and stick to what he does best, tell stories that reflect his values but are neither shallow nor trite and leave the essays to a more dispationate writer.
No one has ever changed a man's attitude by shouting bigot. Peoples prejudices are only changed by experiences that violate their preconceptions and force them to reevaluate their world view.
[ September 09, 2003, 06:41 PM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
That was well said, Rabbit. I think I've typed about five pages worth of stuff in trying to respond to that link, but I just couldn't make it sound anything other than mean and dismissive.
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Rabbit, you do realize that you are one of those liberal professors he's talking about, right? Why, just by riding your bike to work and being concerned about the environment, which isn't in danger from man, you are brainwashing those kids in your charge to the liberal point of view that cars are destroying the ozone and destroying the environment! Posted by Pod (Member # 941) on :
i don't think card was takling about personal activism.
he seems to be complaining more about instutional inquisitions. However in my experience at least, i've never heard of problems with political correctness crusaders in the faculty of my university. So i think that part of his argument is bunk, which is why i want more clarification on what he means.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
What's particularly sad is his comment that anyone who doesn't see things as he does must be,themselves, a PC goon. A damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
quote: I'm tired of the empty testimonials for global warming. Like the statement I recently read: "You won't find a serious scientist who doesn't believe in global warming."
I found it disappointing OSC didn't care to name a couple serious scientists who don't think global warming is happening. Should certainly be possible, and would help his position a lot more than simply alleging it can be done. The scientific remarks he made don't support him at all because they aren't scientific-- they're sound bites. Basically he said: A lot of people say global warming is universally accepted. They're wrong. I'm not going to prove them wrong, instead I'm going to say a few sound bites with no sources or analysis despite claiming for some things evidence and for others lack of evidence, then I'm going to suggest you read a book which doesn't actually address whether or not global warming happens.
I'm particularly annoyed at some of his sound bites for the simple reason that they're well, wrong. For instance, alleging that the case for global warming is solely based off of short term temperature measurements plus computer projections. It's not just based on those, it also draws heavily on millions of years of historic data. He may dispute the interpretation of that data, but it still figures prominently in the case for global warming, a fact that he recklessly (and I hope not intentionally) overlooks.
I expect him to hold himself to a high standard when claiming to debunk others' ideas. He has not come anywhere close to such a standard in the section on global warming.
Standard disclaimers: I'm not a global warming alarmist, I think that it is at worst a concern for the future after more immediate concerns have been taken care of, and may be taken care of coincidentally by taking care of those other concerns.
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Now, maybe I'm about to step in it again, but I don't think the real issue is "Does global warming occur?" but rather, "Does human behavior significantly impact Earth's temperature cycles?" If the answer is no, then alarmism and major anti-global-warming policy shifts are uncalled-for.
Posted by Duragon C. Mikado (Member # 2815) on :
I just now saw Geoff's little trollish remark, claiming I am "anti-family." I don't see how being against marriage is "anti-family," unless your definition of marriage is so culturally narrow that you cannot imagine a positive family setting that does not include a marriage. With ehtnocentric statements like that I wonder why you try at all to consider other ways of life and other viewpoints than your own.
[ September 09, 2003, 07:59 PM: Message edited by: Duragon C. Mikado ]
Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Oh, lighten up. I was teasing you.
And honestly, if your position that marriage is a prison and a blight on society is not "anti-family" in the commonly-understood sense of being "against the traditional nuclear family", then the phrase has no useful meaning. Which may be the case I think that arguing over labels like this ("Pro-choice" versus "Anti-life" or "Pro-life" versus "Anti-choice") is a serious barrier to rational discussion.
Which is why I was JOKING. Let's all be friends.
In any case, your description of my "ethnocentric, culturally narrow-minded opinion" is completely silly. I don't know anyone who thinks that a family must include a marriage to "really be a family". You'd get a lot more persuading done if you'd address my actual opinion instead of just trying to demonize me for opinions I don't have.
[ September 09, 2003, 09:38 PM: Message edited by: Geoffrey Card ]
Posted by Duragon C. Mikado (Member # 2815) on :
Well, all I was left to address was your remark that you now say is a joke. If you had prefaced all your arguments on this thread with it I guess it would be a substantiable point, but since it was made after I had thought I had already sufficiently addressed your points, I took it by itself. But hey, no offense taken, its just conversation.
This is why I like face to face conversation better, intent and purpose is a lot easier to gather with non-verbal communication present. Maybe I'll join you and Slash when he comes to stop by, he already sent me an email. Just give me times well in advance. I really enjoy meeting people that can defend things that totally go against my way of life as intelligently as you do.
[ September 09, 2003, 11:05 PM: Message edited by: Duragon C. Mikado ]
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Geoffrey: except that's not the position he scoffs at. He scoffs at the position that all reputable scientists say it occurs. And he scoffs at it repeatedly, without ever disproving it. I'm not saying it can't be disproven, and in fact I bet it can, but he ridicules it and the people who hold it without bothering to disprove it.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote: The very fact that the global warming advocates are constantly asserting, not their evidence, but rather the fact that "most scientists agree with us," is proof that they are not acting as scientists.
You know I have been reading the scientific literature on global climate change for 20 years and Cards assertions written in this article are patently false. The primary advocates of the theory that human activity is causing global climate change are scientists not environmental activists or politicians. This is a theory that was initially posed by scientists and which has been thoroughly researched for over 40 years. Initially, the theory was controversial, but it isn't any more. Card makes a whole slew of conjectures is this article that are patently false.
quote:After all, there's still no reliable evidence that it's happening.
If Card had made this statement during the drought of the mid 1980's, I would have agreed, but since that time their have been literally hundreds, if not thousands of studies published on this subject nearly all of which report reliable evidence that the global climate is changing.
quote:if it is happening, there is no serious evidence that it is happening because of human intervention rather than as a part of natural weather cycles.
Also patently untrue. Dozens of scientific studies including both theoretical models and experimental data have concluded that the climate change which has occurred during the past century cannot be explained by natural variability (including the influence of solar variability, changes in ocean currents and volcanoes) but can only be attributed to human activity. (see Science August 22, 2003).
quote: Meanwhile, the global warming theory still depends on nothing more than localized temperature measurements over too short a period of time to be interpretable, combined with fanciful computer models that, not surprisingly, return the desired results.
Also blatantly untrue. The theory of global climate change is based on the first law of thermodynamics and the Stefan-Boltzman law of radiatiant heat exchange. The theory was originally proposed based on a scientific understanding of how carbon-dioxide, water, and other green house gases in our atmosphere influence radiant heat exchange between the sun, our planet and the void. No one (and that is not hyperbole) with even a basic understanding of science questions the validity of these theories. Because of the strength of the initial hypothesis, over 40 years of scientific study including both complex computer models, based on well established science not fantasy, and a multitude of measurments have been undertaken to refine the theory. There are still many unknowns in the equation, but the foundations of the theory are extraordinarily strong. What's more, over the past 20 years, the majority of controversies in the field have been resolved.
In the 80s, when my husband first began working in the field, virtual no one in the scientific community was claiming that any they had evidence that human activity was already modifying the global climate. Now, well over 99% of scientists involved in the field are convinced that we have measured change in the climate which is attributable to human activity. This is not because we have all suddenly forgotten our scientific training and fallen under the influence of a radical environmental movement. The change has occurred because the data collected over the past 20 years continues to strength the theory. That includes not only data from recent weather parents, but also data from ice cores and trees that give us a good picture of temperatures over hundreds of thousands of years.
quote: And if it is being caused by human intervention, there's no serious evidence that this global warming is actually going to have deleterious effects.
Here he has a point. The weakness in the science is that we do not completely understand how the oceans, forests, deserts, and clouds interact to produce climate. As a result, we can't accurately predict which parts of the planet will get warm and which parts of the planet will get colder, or which will have increased rain and which will experience drought. We can however confidently concluded several things. These include that it that the ocean level will rise about 1/2 meter which will have a significant deleterious effect in many costal regions, for a time severe storms and droughts will become more common in most parts of the world, major agricultural areas in North American and China will become more arid. Those items alone will have a significant deleterous effect on people and while it is true that people have adapted to changes before, this adaptation has often involved wars, famines and plagues that killed off a good fraction of the population.
Finally I would ask Card if he thinks that its a wise choice to smoke because it isn't 100% certain that you will get lung cancer or emphazema. Would you get on a plane knowing that it had a faulty engine that had a 20% chance of causing a crash? Do you step out in front of speeding cars because there is always a chance that they might see you and stop?
[ September 10, 2003, 07:59 PM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
OK, Now I'm going to rant. I have spent the better part of the last twenty years learning and doing science. It took me five to six years of study before I could read a current research article and understand the subtilties of the work enough to make an educated critique of the value and importance of any scientific work. This is largely because every article published in a peer reviewed journal is read and critiqued by leaders in the field before its published. If it has the kind of critical flaws that can typically be spotted by novices, it never makes it into publication. So when someone like George Bush or Scott Card who has little or no training in science believes that they can look at an entire body of scientific research and dismiss it as shoddy work, I'm appalled and insulted by their arrogance.
After taking one anatomy class, would you presume to teach an experienced spine surgeon how to best repair a spinal injury? That is exactly what politicians and the media are doing with global warming.
At least 99 out of 100 atmospheric scientists agree that global climate change is real and is being caused by the burning of fossil fuels. If hasn't always been that way, 20 years ago there was real controversy, today there isn't. I do not know of one recognized expert in atmospheric sciences who dismisses this as a specious theory. If you know of one, please give me his/her name so that I can review their work and assess the validity of their claims. The only scientists I know who still consider there to be any controversy are funded by the oil and coal industry or conservative think tanks or do not have any expertise in atmospheric chemistry. The arguments they make in public forums, have already been widely studied and refuted by leading scientists.
Controversies don't disappear arbitrarily in science. They only disappear when evidence piles up in favor of one side. That is what has happened in global climate change.
From inside the scientific community, the theory of global climate change is not controversial. When I have attended American Geophysical Union meeting (the premere scientific society for environmental research), no one is arguing about the theory of global climate change -- it has been accepted as true. There are plenty of controversies that people debate avidly, but the Greenhouse gas theory is not among them. It is nearly universally accepted. Controversy only exists in the media and politics.
Unfortunately, there are a few hold outs who have taken the debate to the court of public opinion specifically because they can't make their case among scientists. There criticisms don't hold water among scientist because we understand they issues well enough to critically review their work. Among politicians they are very popular because they tell people what they want to here. What they are doing is unethical and irresponsible? Those who listen to them are arrogant fools. Do they really believe that thousands of scientists throughout the world are incompetant? Or perhaps they believe that 99% of the atmospheric science community is part of a radical conspiracy to destroy the technological world?
Isn't it much more reasonable to believe that a small group of people who stand to make huge profits from selling oil, coal and gas don't want to believe the truth?
[ September 10, 2003, 12:10 PM: Message edited by: The Rabbit ]
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Rabbit, you are wasting your breath. One of the core reasons that there has been a concerted attack on universities is so conservatives can dismiss research they don't like by sniffing 'oh, that's liberal science, not real science. We all know that scientists in universities have an agenda. :/
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
::Applauds Rabbit::
As usual, Dr. Rabbit, you blow me away. Excellent posts. I just had a much less eloquent version of this conversation with my boss a few weeks ago; I wish I'd had your post to refer to at that time.
It's unlikely that OSC will happen across this thread, but I would love to know what he had to say in response to your posts. I don't think you're wasting your breath, by the way; OSC strikes me as a bright, thoughtful person, and while he has strong opinions, I expect that they aren't fossilized, and would be subject to change as long as they weren't informed by his religious beliefs (so, for example, you might change his mind about global warming, but probably wouldn't change his mind about the effect of homosexuality on society).
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
Aiieee! I skip a day and we are on to global warming from "anti-family!" Oh well, back to where I left off.
Geoff, you are right, I was being a bit silly with my last post but the point remains the same. I have no clear working definition of "anti-family" at the university level (where all those liberal intellectuals hang out) per the Card perspective. Kayla brought the point to a head, pitting the hot-button abortion topic against the "anti-family" terminology. Her examples were excellent and put the point in clear perspective: Are you "anti-family" if you support a 15 year old mother-to-be to have an abortion? Or, are you "anti-family" if you encourage that 15 year old girl to have the child and thus become, dare I say it, most likely a single parent. And since the traditional definition of "Anti-family" would scoff at the single parent household, it puts two strong ideals at odds.
I think it really does all come down to choice and this is a word that traditional conservative rhetoric can't abide, which is why it never really shows up in their dogma, as it does in liberal ideology.
You can be pro-choice regarding abortion but think that abortion is a horrible choice (as I do). You can be pro-choice with homosexuality (meaning people can choose who they want to marry or commit to in an intimate relationship) but be homophobic (not like me, but I know plenty of people who say they aren't comfortable with it but don't feel it is their place to tell adults who they can sleep with). You can be pro-choice with end of life issues but think that doctor assisted suicide is frightening.
While the liberals are derided because they put their faith in government to solve all problems (as Rush would point out, though I would disagree) Conservatives think the same way, except they want to limit choices or remove them completely. They, more than liberals, propose Constitutional amendments even, such as ban on Flag burning or ban on gay marriages that continue to get bandied about Congress. Heck with laws, go above them! If that isn't mis-use of government, I don't know what is.
So for my buck, I would say "anti-family" means supporting a choice of family structure that goes against the "traditional" grain, whatever that tradition is. For OSC, I assume it is the two parent, 2.3 kids, dog in the yard, etc. As long as the two parents are heterosexual, that is. My good lady friends who are married and have a child (and even the dog!) wouldn't fit that picture and, by having only the traditional definition of anti-family, would be probably considered by OSC (and other conservatives) to be "anti-family." It saddens me, I suppose.
If there is a better description of it, let me know.
fil
PS Also, thanks all for the conversation! These are tough topics and e-discussions make it hard to read people a bit, but I do just enjoy the discussion and not any "heat" that may be behind it. Excelsior!
Posted by fil (Member # 5079) on :
Rabbit...excellent. That is a worthy piece to save for those rainy day discussions about the Global Warming debate. Well put.
fil
Posted by Hazen (Member # 161) on :
quote:We can however confidently concluded several things. These include that it that the ocean level will rise about 2 meters
quote:Globally, sea level will rise at an increasing rate, although the rate of rise may not be significantly greater than at present. The most reasonable estimates for the rate of sea level rise are 5 - 40 cm by 2050 as compared to a rise of 5 - 12 cm if the rates of rise over the past century continue.
So I don't know if you should be quite so sure about your figures.
quote:The theory of global climate change is based on the first law of thermodynamics and the Stefan-Boltzman law of radiatiant heat exchange.
I wonder about this. Those aren't esoteric scientific theories, those are some of the most basic things about science. Saying that the theory of global warming is based on those doesn't really establish much. I am sure that the actual models they use are far more complicated. The real question is whether the amount of greenhouse gases is increasing enough to have a significant effect on climate. I don't have much of an opinion on it, but I notice that the summary linked to above was much more moderate.
Fil says:
quote:Are you "anti-family" if you support a 15 year old mother-to-be to have an abortion? Or, are you "anti-family" if you encourage that 15 year old girl to have the child and thus become, dare I say it, most likely a single parent.
Since, of course, we know that those are the only two options. But what about adoption? That changes the equation a little bit. Suddenly, it is a girl having to go through nine months of discomfort in order to sustain a life she brought into being, or a girl ending that life in order to have full freedom of movement during what would have been the pregnancy. Quite frankly, I think that if she has voluntarily chosen to sleep with someone, she should have to endure the discomfort of pregnancy in order to preserve the child's life.
As for the article, I thought it was quite good. I don't think that there is enough diversity of opinion on campuses, especially in the humanities and social sciences. In a lot of your responses, I noticed quite a bit of, shall we say, "hyperbole, straw men, red herrings, and emotionalism." Note that some have said that he must think only conservatives should be allowed on campus. The whole point of his article was that more voices should be let in, not more shut out. And he did a decent enough job of defending it. His side points, like his bits about the family, were obviously not studied with as much depth of his main thesis. I think his article could have used a few more footnotes to better establish some details, but I don't think it was the masterpiece of irrationality that some have suggested.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
Hazen, I ought to proof read my post better. The post should have read 1/2 meter not 2 meters. Thank you for pointing out my error.
quote: I wonder about this. Those aren't esoteric scientific theories, those are some of the most basic things about science. Saying that the theory of global warming is based on those doesn't really establish much. I am sure that the actual models they use are far more complicated. The real question is whether the amount of greenhouse gases is increasing enough to have a significant effect on climate. I don't have much of an opinion on it, but I notice that the summary linked to above was much more moderate.
Please look at the context of my post. It was intended to refute Card accusation that Global warming theories were based solely on a few localized measurements and fanciful models. The accusation is not simply an exageration of the facts, it is demonstrably, completely and totally untrue.
You are correct that the summary you link to is more moderate than my statements. It is also 9 years old and much of what was considered uncertain or controversial a decade ago has become widely accepted because of additional research.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Boy . . . a lotta good posts by people on both sides. I'm not interested in joining in the debates on abortion, global warming, the free market, or homosexuality at this time (instead, I'll just be enigmatic and say that I think Card is 2 for 4 on these ). However, with a firm awareness of the fact that the plural of anecdote is not data, I will say that I double-majored in mathematics and literature (with minors in computer science and theology), I went to graduate school for literature, and have taken graduate courses in education in the course of my career. And, in my experience, while many professors of math, science, and computer science tend to be at least somewhat conservative, virtually every professor I ever had in literature, education, theology (in a Catholic university!), social science, and humanities was distinctly liberal in bent. And again, in my experience, the science teachers, the conservative teachers, were more open-minded, or simply less concerned. Their views were not strictly party-line, they more often managed to keep their politics out of the classroom, and they were not perturbed when people did express views that contradicted their own. I frequently had the experience in humanities classes of hearing teachers make irrelevant political statements in the middle of lectures, beginning dialogues with the consideration that certain premises were axiomatic, like that Bush (Sr.) was a bad president, promiscuity was normal and even a good thing, all men were rapists at heart, all straight men were terrified of homosexuals and would oppress them if given half a chance, abortion and euthanasia should be legal under all but the most extreme curcumstances, and all of the ills of the world were caused by white europeans. I'm not particularly conservative, by the way. I have voted for candidates from both major parties and one minor one, and consider myself predominantly liberal in most of my views, with some exceptions that are crucial to me. But I definitely had the experience in college (as I noted, a Catholic school!), grad school (Clemson University, in the heart of the conservative south!), and since, of keeping some views to myself, because I knew that expressing them would be detrimental to my grade in the class. (Cowardice? Yeah. So sue me. *shrug* Hopefully I'm older and wiser now.) I get the distinct impression from talking to others that this was a common feeling at many different schools. If your experience has been different, then maybe your school was not like this, or maybe you don't notice the oppressive climate because you happen to hold the same beliefs that are favored by the folks in power.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Icarus, I had much the same experience. Most of my science professors were probably conservative, but with the exception of one or two LDS English professors, ALL the humanities professors were wildly liberal.
However, there were only a few that made it very obvious. On the other hand, I went to school in small-town Utah, and a third of their students were return missionaries. If they had been too far to the left, they would have alienated their students completely. Some tried anyway, but the good ones could teach without fighting them.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
Rabbit, I was reading the current issue of New Scientist and came across an article that I'd be curious to hear your response to. It's called You Can't Control the Climate. Reducing carbon emissions in the hope this will stop global warming is a flawed idea, argues Philip Stott. Better to react to climate change as it happens.
Stott, who is listed as a professor emeritus of biogeography at the University of London, states that "I am a mildly left-wing global warming sceptic. For me the real questions have never been 'Is climate changing?' or 'Are humans influencing climate?'. Climate always changes, and humans affect climate in many ways, not just through carbon dioxide emissions. I don't believe we will ever be able to manage the climate in a predictable manner by trying to manipulate just one of the enormous number of nautral and human factors involved."
I don't think that the article is available to non-subscribers online, and out of respect for the magazine I don't want to just transcribe it, but I will quote some other relevant passages.
quote:Over the past few weeks, a number of studies have emerged that cast doubt on the significance of human-made global warming and the climate models on which the dominant theory is largely based....One of the most important investigates the link between climate change and galactic cosmic rays (GSA Today, vol 13 p4).
The referenced article appears to be by Jan Veizer, a geochemist at the Ruhr University at Bochum, Germany and the University of Ottawa, Canada, and Nir Shaviv, an astrophysicist at teh Racah Institute of Physics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It claims that cosmic rays account for up to 75% of climate variations, and further states that the researchers found no correlation between temperature variation and the changing patterns of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Apparently Veizer had an article about the latter claim in Nature in 2000 (vol 408, p 698).
Also, according to the New Scientist article, there was an article in last month's Progress in Physical Geography (vol 27, page 448) by Willie Soon and Sallie Baliunas of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics that was critical of the current models of the interactions between the oceans, atmosphere, land, and ice cover, on which current thinking about global warming is based.
The article states that "Soon and Baliunas go on to stress that no general circulation model has successfully simulated the observation that while temperatures at the surface of the Earth have continued to rise, the lower atmosphere has not warmed at all. Yet if CO2 plays the substantial role in climate change the global warming lobby insist it does, this layer should be warming faster than the surface air."
The author concludes with a paragraph in which he states that "though the 'global warming myth' has become immensely powerful, the science of climate change remains deeply uncertain. I believe it is vital to acknowledge this uncertainty."
So, what do you think? Are you familiar with the work of Veizer, Shaviv, Soon, and Baliunas? Does their work actually cast doubt on current models of global warming, as the New Scientist article states that they do? If so, what do you make of it? Are you familiar with Stott's work? I'm very curious to know what you think about this, as it flies in the face of my pervious understanding of the issue.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Ooh. Galactic Cosmic Rays.
That's what made me eat all the Pringles.
Yeah.
::dons tin-foil hat::
[ September 23, 2003, 01:13 PM: Message edited by: Icarus ]
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
I wonder if any of the Fantastic 4 had an increased ability/drive to eat Pringles?
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:Since I realize you guys are Christians, I hope you don't mind if I say 'Mormons'. LDS sounds like a corporate entity or something, and I ain't typing the full name of the church out whenever I'm posting to or about Mormons. Sorry. My fingers would soon fall off.
I'm declaring a pogrom if you use the word "Mormon" instead of "a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints"
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I suppose that depends how you define "liberal." I consider myself a liberal, for the most part. And while I am not in favor of abortion, generally speaking, I find the idea of the government making that decision abhorrent. And not every person who chooses abortion is "anti-family"!
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