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They think urban intellectuals have a fair bit of power. They also think they are not always correct, not always unbiased, and possibly not always honest; and
by wisty 1y ago
They think urban intellectuals have a fair bit of power.
They also think they are not always correct, not always unbiased, and possibly not always honest; and the bias tends to be towards either things that benefit the urban elite, or "luxury beliefs" that have disproportionate costs on other people.
- Eisenstein 1y agoNo one is always correct or always unbiased or always honest, and everyone's bias benefits themselves, and every person in the United States lives in a way that has disproportionate costs to other people. None of those reasons explain any of the antipathy. What does?
- wisty 1y agoThey think urban intellectuals have a fair bit of power. And the basis for that power is that they are supposedly right about things.
- Eisenstein 1y agoIs it possible to not speak in riddles please?
- ben_w 1y agoI am confused why you see that as a riddle. Group X does action A_x due to belief B_x. That B_x isn't logical or whatever doesn't matter. Members of group X generally don't know that group X is wrong, and instead think their own biases are common sense etc. People are not perfectly rational spheres in a vacuum. That you can substitute in a lot of different values for X, doesn't change any of this.
- Eisenstein 1y agoNothing they commented mentions any of the processes you did. A statement in which people need to figure out the specifics in order to make an interpretation is generally thought of as a riddle.
- vesinisa 1y agoBigotry. They are completely open that LGBT and other minority rights offend them, and they want to punish those who support such rights. These people are far more concentrated in urban centers. Spite politics is the ultimate form of post industrial vanity. People are so well off and have so little to worry about that their biggest ask from their leaders is to bully those who they don't like. Though I don't agree with it, I think many conservatives feel the same way about e.g. trans rights - that it's a form of post industrial vanity.
- teiferer 1y agoExcellent observation. Either side can (and does) easily accuse their opponents of this. Some don't like anti-immigrant, anti-gay, anti-climate rethoric. Others don't like trans-rights, anti-hate-speech, anti-christianity rethoric. For either side, those are not real problems which their opponents are concerned about. That's an underappreciated aspect of current public discourse.
- eptcyka 1y agoAre you talking about math PhDs? What power do they have, politically?
- ktallett 1y agoI imagine many go on to be analysts of markets
- wisty 1y agoWhy suggest math PhDs unless it's in bad faith? Wouldn't economics and sociology PhDs have both more room for bias in their work, and tend to have power over the economy and society? "Experts" have a lot of sway over the public sector and legal system. The public sector has increased to take up a huge percentage of GDP, and the legal sector has also arguably expanded a lot in power. The perception is that a huge amount of public spending is controlled by the public service, and they tend to defer to academics if the executive keeps them in line.
- intended 1y agoIf someone hasn’t done the legwork why should they be in the same arena ? We don’t put NBA professionals in the same league as newbies. Expertise in this case isn’t cheaply earned. It’s the top of a pyramid of intellectual effort.
- jaredklewis 1y ago> Why suggest math PhDs unless it's in bad faith? Maybe because this thread is about a math PhD (Terrence Tao)? I’m also surprised you believe academic economists have much power. These days, most politicians from both parties in the US proudly reject more or less all of mainstream economics. Sometimes, the work of academic economists can have some small influence on decisions at the Fed, so I guess that is something. Sociologists don’t even have that. They’re more or less just talking to themselves.
- wisty 1y agoIf only politicians mattered why doesn't Trump sack virtually everyone in DC? The government is a large organisation and its middle management is both vast and powerful. And this huge middle management is obliged (arguably) to listen to academia unless otherwise instructed by politicians (who are too few in number and mostly not talented in steering large organisations so much as they are used to just going with the flow and taking the credit).