Why scientists are seldom Republicans

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/columns/why-scientists-are-seldom-republicans/1027502

By Robyn E. Blumner, Times Columnist
In Print: Sunday, August 16, 2009

Have you ever wondered what the world would be like without scientists? Ask the Republican Party. It lives in such a world. Republicans have been so successful in driving out of their party anyone who endeavors in scientific inquiry that pretty soon there won't be anyone left who can distinguish a periodic table from a kitchen table.

It is no wonder the Republican throngs showing up to disrupt town hall meetings on health care reform are so gullible, willing to believe absurd claims like the coming of "death panels." Their party is nearly devoid of neuroscientists, astrophysicists, marine biologists or any other scientific professional who would insist on intellectual rigor, objective evidence and sound reasoning as the basis for public policy development. The people left don't have that kind of discipline and don't expect it from their leaders. They are willing to believe anything some right-wing demagogue with a cable show or pulpit tells them, no matter how outlandish.

Since the Sonia Sotomayor nomination we've been hearing about the GOP's Hispanic deficit. Only 26 percent of Latino registered voters now say they identify with or lean toward the Republican Party. But that's a full house compared with scientists. Only 12 percent of scientists in a poll issued last month by the Pew Research Center say they are Republican or lean toward the GOP, while fully 81 percent of scientists say they are Democrats or lean Democratic.

We shouldn't be surprised that people who are open to evidence-based thinking have abandoned the Republican Party. The GOP has proudly adopted the mantle of the "Terri Schiavo, global warming shwarming" party with the Bush administration helping cement the image by persistently subverting science to serve a religious agenda or corporate greed. snip

Global warming is a prime example.

Earth is under siege by CO2 emissions to a point that the Pentagon is warning that our national security is at risk if climate change is not arrested. All Americans and politicians should be united for collective action. Yet George Bush spent essentially his entire presidency ignoring and suppressing scientific concerns.

[SoCalDem]

1. Science is about FACTS. Republicans don't "do" facts

they are hopelessly mired in the world of Fairy Tales, Fiction, Myths & Fables.

[Merlot]

27. You're being nice. I call them outright lies.

And the lying liars who tell them (with a nod to Sen. Franken).

[Avalux]

2. Scientists live in the real world of facts. They deal in proof, not belief.

Critical thinking, asking "why"; invention, solutions.....

All the things anathema to Republicans.

[DrDan]

3. same for college faculty members

predominantly D.

[Buzz Clik]

7. I've know two college faculty members who were of the jaw-dropping style of conservative.

Both fundies, both misogynistic and apparently racist. Also, both are full time teachers with little interest in scientific pursuits.

[DrDan]

9. that sounds quite unusual - are the faculty from from a conservative/religious school?

[Buzz Clik]

13. No. They are from fairly standard universities.

Another of my colleagues received a BS from Bob Jones University. He never expresses his politics, so I have no idea about him. He's an amazing scientist in a field that fundies would find appalling. :shrug:

[Kievan Rus]

19. Evolutionary science?

[Buzz Clik]

25. Genetics

[whopis01]

33. As a professor from a large university, I can assure you that this is a bit of a myth.

There are probably more Democrats than Republicans on the faculty, but it is not an overwhelming majority. In some departments it is certainly the other way around. It really depends primarily on the department involved. I think that those who have an interest in the social sciences often tend to be liberals and progressives, so those departments end up with a greater number of Democrats. If you have a look at the engineering, medical, and criminal justice departments, you have more of an even break or even a split favoring Republicans.

I think that the myth is propagated simply because an engineering professor is less likely to be talking or writing about politics and government policy (as part of their job) than is a social scientist. Thus you end up with a majority of the publishings related to politics coming out of the departments with a higher liberal concentration.

[Retired AF Dem]

35. Great post

one of the best ever written on DU.

[tabasco]

37. Those are your personal observations and do nothing to refute the survey,

Professor. LOL.

[Retired AF Dem]

38. And we all know just how accurate surveys and

exit polls are.

[whopis01]

40. You seem to be a bit confused

The survey (at least the one that I believe you are referring to) was a survey of scientists. My comments were about professors at colleges. These are not the same group and I was not intending to refute the survey in question.

[lefthandedlefty]

36. Do they teach at religous type schools

I have a sister in law that graduated a relious college here in KY and she told me they taught theory not fact.

[Buzz Clik]

4. I'm surrounded by Republican scientists.

Their politics are often insane, but they are intelligent people and good scientists.

No question, however, that the most brilliant in my realm are all Dems.

[tabatha]

6. I have encountered Republican scientists.

Good scientists, but sometimes their irrationality creeps into their work when something is unknown.
Believing something to be a fact when it is not, and most times the belief turns out to be wrong - i.e. rather than waiting for the facts before coming to a conclusion.
But otherwise, very hard-working and innovative.

[Buzz Clik]

8. Do you think that's more a result of blind faith rather than conservatism?

[tabatha]

22. It is because of the characteristic I have found in many right-wingers

"I am right" - regardless of anything other then shallow observation to support it.
No hesitancy or self-doubt.
Another left-winger scientist I know is one who needs solid irrefutable data before arriving at a conclusion.

[Buzz Clik]

26. I see.

[Bluerthanblue]

5. I think more important than "facts" is the ability and desire

to LEARN, EXPLORE, and be willing to embrace CHANGE.

To not be complacent, afraid to question accepted theories, and to think outside the accepted norms.

My Dad was a Scientist (PhD Rutgers '51) he was a registered Rep. but a true independent and one of the smartest people i've ever known.

He encouraged all his kids to question the established ways of doing, seeing, approaching almost everything, and taught us that the only time you completely 'fail' is when you refuse to try. Mistakes aren't failures, they are the foundation stones on the path to success.

[OutNow]

10. Fact Based Politics in former USSR

Andrei Sakharov, the scientist behind atomic bomb research in the former USSR, was only the most prominent physicist who opposed Soviet-style rule. Many physicists and other leading scientists formed the core of the civil rights and civil liberties movement.

As Sakharov explained, this was a major political problem for the Soviet bureaucrats. In order to make scientific advances in nuclear and other leading edge fields, students had to be taught to do fact based analysis and critical thinking. This skill set, much to the dismay of the Soviet leaders, could not be restricted to scientific endeavors alone. Over the years, scientists began demanding a civil society based on the same criteria. This cadre of critical thinkers was key to Glasnost.

It's obvious that any political system based on a rigid belief system, whether it's Republican Neanderthals or Stalinist bureaucrats, will drive out fact based science and scientists. I'm not surprised at all that most scientists are Democrats in this country.

[slampoet]

11. I miss William F. Buckley. THERE was a Conservative who not only thought before speaking....

...but also he could tell you HOW he arrived at his opinions and Why.


If the GOP were to emulate Buckley there would be a lot more Republican Scientists.

[BlooInBloo]

16. You mean William Whites-Are-The- More-Advanced-Race Buckley?

Genius.

Yah, I miss him too. Gosh do I miss him. The world is such a poorer place without him. I just don't know how we go on without more people like him.

[slampoet]

28. Do you get paid by the ad hominem, or does it come to you naturally?

Maybe you should get that looked at.


Then again you could always stop posting on DU 68+ times a day and go outside to learn some social skills besides eating kabob.

But i guess i'll just let the asshole have the last word.

[BolivarianHero]

18. Odd fact...

Buckley was a proponent of cannabis legalization, and yet somebody on a message board I used to frequent who went by the name William F. Buckley III was a crusader for prohibition.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

12. I wonder how they identified the scientists.

I wonder if M.D.s are considered scientists.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

14. Why am I not surprised?

K&R

[BlooInBloo]

15. Because it's very difficult to be both smart and republican. Durr.

[BolivarianHero]

20. If I were a scientist...

Would I want to be on the same side as a room full of Mike Huckabee or Tom Coburn supporters? *shudders*

[Kievan Rus]

17. Reality has a well-known liberal bias

An adage that's an oldie but a goodie. And so true.

[ThomWV]

21. Just about every Engineer I have ever known was a Republican

[NJCher]

29. engineers are student sof how things work

And so are republicans. They love to study up on things like how "democracy" in America really works--so they can subvert it.


Cher

[joeybee12]

23. This is great...a definite K&R!

[drmeow]

24. It looks like the study was of

members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science - as they define them, scientists are people who do scientific research. Membership in AAAS is predominantly university faculty in fields such as physics, chemistry, biology, psychology, etc. It is unlikely to include university faculty in the humanities (most of whom are probably liberal) or in business (most of whom are conservative). The rest are people who work for independent research firms (bio-tech, pharmaceutical, etc) and scientist who work for NIH. They are not people who had to take a lot of science classes in college (i.e., engineers, chemists, biologists, even MDs) unless they went on to get Ph.D.s

[DeSwiss]

30. K&R

[onestepforward]

31. I know a NASA engineer who does not believe in

global warming and he is a total wingnut.

[ThomWV]

41. I worked for DOE for about 25 years and most of their Engineers were right wing zelots

It was disgusting.

[krispos42]

32. Because a party that creates it's own reality is not good for the scientific method

One of the reasons that scientists had trouble believing the age of the Earth was that they had observed and calculate the size of the Sun, and could not come up with a combustion process that lasted more than a few tens of millions of years, while geologiss were estimating the age of the Earth in the hundreds of millions of years.

It took E=mc² to figure out where all that energy was coming from.

Considering that even now, vast numbers of Americans think that the Earth is only 7,000 years old, they simply would have tossed out all that contradictory science and tried to prove sciance via the Bible.


And we'd still be hunting buffalo with flint spears and panicking over every lunar eclipse.

[deaniac21]

34. I a agree with the sentiment but Blumner doesn't name a

source for any of his facts. I wish writers would always do that.

[tj2001]

39. Most physicists are liberals, and most engineers are registered Republicans.

It's a well-known fact.

Engineers are by and large stolid/rigid ("what formula do I use?") technicians by training and temperament.