Here is a follow-up article written by one of the 33 members of the University of Pennsylvania Law School faculty to sign a letter criticizing Amy Wax:
Don’t Care if Amy Wax Is Politically Incorrect; I Do Care that She’s Empirically Incorrect
All they care is that she is "Politically Incorrect" -- they could not care less about the facts.
Not to mention that when someone is wrong about facts you correct them, you don't fire them or ask for their condemnation. Professors are not supposed to be correct, just to probe for what's correct. In fact they should be encouraged to be boldly inquisitive and incorrect in that pursuit, and use dialog to sort out the ultimate answer.
And of course even "incorrect" ideas can be considered correct in an era -- in the 19th and up to the mid-20th century there were all kinds of facts and studies showing how some races were genetically inferior available to racists (that is: almost everybody).
Now we laugh at them, but how many similar (or even in the reverse direction) BS we take as fact because social "scientists" just put things under the rug and only give facts and statistics that are compatible with current cultural norms?
Indeed - if Prof. Klick really "[doesn't] care if Amy Wax is politically correct", why did he sign a letter that says "We categorically reject Wax’s claims", instead of refuting them? Refutation is so much more effective than condemnation.
It is strange and disturbing to see academia joining the alt-right in its attempt to resurrect a pre-enlightenment age of dogma and allegations of heresy. For academia, it is a losing proposition.
> All they care is that she is "Politically Incorrect" -- they could not care less about the facts.
Remember the saying "perception is reality"? Keep that in the back of your mind, I predict it is going to become increasingly indispensable to understand events going forward in Western nations.
Professors are supposed to present the conclusions they've come to from their studies and work with no "self-awareness" filtering to avoid hurting anybody's feelings. Doubly so in an article, which is not a scholarly paper, and is meant to represent a broader picture with broader strokes.
And being a professor is not about only presenting raw factoids. It's also about drawing conclusions from the data and pointing to the bigger picture the way you interpret them -- a bigger picture that no data are going to give you by themselves alone. Informing the public opinion is not about being a glorified statistician.
Of course nobody would have batted an eye if a processor had done exactly the same kind of "stating of facts" for opinions they like (and that goes for "righteous indignation" both sides, left and right).
I think in the world of economics, those are very fuzzy lines. Economics and law are full of conjecture, the belief that if one thing is true, others will probably be as well (see supply-side economics, Marxism, and so on), and the amount those views are clung to despite existing data is startling. I don't agree with the conclusions she comes to, but it's not a huge jump from what economists the Krugman do all the time.
The response makes the situation even more absurd. Suddenly it is OK to denounce a professor because he/she is not correct from someones point of view? Isn't a debate about what is real and what is not the base for any science?
I would understand, but not be happy for, that professors are called for not being politically correct. I can't understand denouncing for not being correct by someone's argumentation.
I believe more and more that social justice and seeking for truth are not compatible.
What concerns me is that people act like she doesn't have the right to write her opinion (it clearly is just her opinion; it was published to the opinion section), without her facing repercussion.
Tolerance only goes so far. You can have whatever opinion you want, but that doesn't mean you get to escape the consequences of having views that people find objectionable.
You can certainly walk around town telling everyone they are stupid, but you shouldn't be surprised when everyone hates you afterward. "It's just my opinion" is a weak excuse.
It's not an opinion, it's a conjecture. Opinions are emotional responses to facts, not arguments about their veracity.
Examples of opinions include:
The color red is beautiful.
I'm sad that sharks are being hunted.
I hate poor people.
None of the following are opinions:
This rose is red.
My landlord poisoned my dog.
Poor people do more drugs than rich people.
In particular, a statement is not an opinion simply because it is presented without evidence. It is only an opinion if it can't possess any in the first place.
If that were what this was about, it would all be a bunch of papers and op-eds discussing the evidence. And it's nice that you can link to some of that, and I wish this controversy was all just ding-dong of evidence, counter-evidence and the interpretations thereof.
But it's hard to see the linked article as anything but a fig-leaf, when the centre of the actual controversy is an attempt to sack Prof Wax, on the grounds that her arguments are morally unacceptable.
Thanks for posting. The original article is clearly hyper-racist--how unbelievable that the only cultural tradition suited for the 21st century also just happens to be the one which you hail from--but also just weirdly certain about things that deserve no certainty.
All they care is that she is "Politically Incorrect" -- they could not care less about the facts.
Not to mention that when someone is wrong about facts you correct them, you don't fire them or ask for their condemnation. Professors are not supposed to be correct, just to probe for what's correct. In fact they should be encouraged to be boldly inquisitive and incorrect in that pursuit, and use dialog to sort out the ultimate answer.
And of course even "incorrect" ideas can be considered correct in an era -- in the 19th and up to the mid-20th century there were all kinds of facts and studies showing how some races were genetically inferior available to racists (that is: almost everybody).
Now we laugh at them, but how many similar (or even in the reverse direction) BS we take as fact because social "scientists" just put things under the rug and only give facts and statistics that are compatible with current cultural norms?