I'd like to publicly thank the moderators for their extremely prompt attention to my earlier post and for their help in recovering the post in question. Kudos!
Nothing like having a thread locked in the middle of writing a long post on a
subject. This will stand as my final thoughts on the matter, and if anyone
feels like continuing the discussion, I'll leave that up to them.
Fox Wrote:
Quote:Okay, I'm going to type really slow so even Sozobe can't miss it. I did
respond to that post
I believe the group stating there is evidence of liberal bias on American
college campuses have made a case. They/we have posted data showing that there is bias. They/we have posted personal experience. And they/we have posted numerous informed opinions from liberal, conservative, and moderate sources supporting the thesis and citing other data and other experience.
The side alluding to the fact that there is no evidence of a problem have
refused all data/evidence/opinion provided by "my" side and state we have not made our case. They however keep beating the drum that they don't have to make any kind of case but the burden is on my side to prove our side.
I say we've proved it. There is excessive liberal bias on college campuses, this results in distorted and incomplete education for the students and therefore is bad teaching, and students subjected to consistent bad teachings are harmed.
I will say when somebody posts something/anything that is anything other than some uninformed extreme left wing opinion that disputes the facts I/we have posted, I will be more than happy to consider such evidence or reasoned argument. Until then, I say we have made a pretty strong case here.
I don't consider the debate closed, however. Throughout the history of this
country, activists have been raised up to protest and force change in oppressive practices creating great inequalities. And those who saw no problem have been virulent and hateful in their opposition to such activism. But perhaps Horowitz is the first wave of protest to address and correct an inequity here.
That was the intended purpose of this thread. And I think it a subject worth discussing.
Excellent, other than the part where you said you responded; you didn't address any of the points at all. That's not responding.
Quote:I say we've proved it. There is excessive liberal bias on college
campuses, this results in distorted and incomplete education for the students and therefore is bad teaching, and students subjected to consistent bad teachings are harmed.
We say, you haven't proved it. You are missing a step in your logic and your sources don't provide that step. We have not refused all of your data or evidence. We accept that data for what it is:
Anecdotal accounts
Pundit Opinion
And scientific survey
The problem, as I'll show, that we have with yer argument is that there is a
logical jump as we move through it:
Quote:
Question: Is there liberal bias on campus?
Evidence: Anecdotal stories from students. Survey data about orientation. Pundit opinion.
Logical Path:
There are, according to the Survey Data, more liberal profs than Conservative Profs.
Argument 1: This shows a bias against Conservative Profs, who can't get hired
Argument 2: This is detrimental to the learning experience of students, as one viewpoint isn't balanced.
Conclusion: The prevailing Liberal bias on Campus is Detrimental to students, and this is proven through the evidence of Surveys showing how many Liberal profs there are on Campus, by Anecdotal reports, and by Pundit Opinion.
The problem is, the evidence that you have presented does not, in fact, support either argument 1 nor argument 2, due to a lack of data.
It's not that the ideas you are putting forth are neccessarily terrible
arguments inasof themselves; just that they haven't been properly supported by the data.
Argument 1 states that there are many more Profs that are Liberal, than
Conservative, on our Campuses. This argument then goes on to state that this shows a bias against Conservative professors, because they are locked out of the system by all the Liberals.
But are they? Does the evidence that you have put forth actually support this claim? I don't think so.
The Anecdotal Opinions you have put forth are of only small use to this claim. The vast majority of them concern student-teacher relations, and are not inter-faculty in nature.
The Survey Evidence that has been presented is of little use in this claim,
because all it does is represent the situation, not the cause of the situation. It says what
is, not what makes it that way. So this evidence forms the argument but does not solve the argument.
The Pundit Opinion that you have presented us does not support this claim with evidence. All it does is arrive to the same conclusion, with the same logical jump, as your argument does.
SO, what would be evidence that this argument is true?
- Reports of the Conservative Grad students and Profs who are trying to get jobs and can't (Anecdotal)
- Surveys done of schools turning down applicants vs. their political
orientation from the rolls(Survey Evidence)
- Opinion and Scientific pieces done by Pundits and Experts who correlate the above data and place it in a clear, argumentative fashion(Pundit Opinion)
It's not even that you are using the wrong
type of data, just that the
data you have provided doesn't quite cover your argument.
You must consider the possible other factors of: What if less Conservatives apply for faculty positions than Liberals do? This seems an equally plausible solution, and in the abscense of data I don't think we can conclude that argument 1 stands upon the merit of the evidence presented.
Argument 2 has two parts, which I will address seperately: Inherent Bias in the course material, and Profs who talk about seperate subjects than their course material.
The Inherent Bias in the source material has not been upheld, in any way, by the evidence that you have supplied us with.
The Anecdotal Evidence, once again, deals far more often with Profs who talk about seperate subjects than the course material itself. And it is somewhat difficult to tell if the course material is presented accurately in anonymous reports; if there are three conservative books on the reading list, and three liberal ones, and the teacher is being complained about for being a liberal, what if the student just doesn't type in the titles of the conservative books? The reports cannot be said to be useful for this case (though they are for the next one, don't worry!).
The Survey Evidence that has been presented, unfortunately, has little to do with the content of the courses taught. There has been some talk in the past about titles of specific courses, but I don't think any concerted effort at taking a broad look at the level of bias in the courses themselves has been accomplished to date, and certainly not with the data presented.
The Pundit Opinion is more useful here than in the past argument, but without a solid body of data to work off of, it does not uphold the argument on it's own. It does not show that the average liberal teaches his course in a slanted way; just that a certain number of them have been reported to, and there certainly are a large number of liberals.
I suspect that if you worded your argument out loud to me, it would say: 'Well, in a faculty that is mostly all liberal, how will students get exposed to conservative thought? Of COURSE there is a bias inherent!!' I can see where this is emotionally appealing, but unfortunately, and this is the critical part, there is a large gap in the logic:
There is no data which shows that the average teacher, Liberal or not, injects their political bias into the AVERAGE subject, even with the Liberal(gasp!) Arts area, in a manner which is detrimental to the student!
Because of this lack of data, this argument fails.
How could this data be shown?
- Anecdotal evidence seems once again of limited use here without a concerted effort of specificity, which brings us to:
- Survey evidence can be beefed up severely on this one. A study can easily be done showing that those professors who identify themselves as liberal have historically taught classes with a much greater liberal slant, with the proof
being the reading assignments/essay questions/Final Exam questions. All it takes is a little effort.
- Pundit and expert opinion can once again be used to bolster your argument by showing how the above evidence supports the argument.
Once again, it isn't that the argument is bad, it is that the evidence that you have presented just doesn't support the argument you are trying to make.
The Second part, Profs who talk about seperate subjects than their course
material, is a bad argument! Why? Because those are
bad profs! In some cases, bad Profs who HAPPEN to be liberal!
Noone has tried to defend these bad professors, who are literally STEALING from their students if they don't teach what they are paid to teach, and instead talk about politics, or their cat, or WHATEVER.
If the argument you are attempting to make is the "Liberals make Bad Profs," Then I should inform you that nothing that you have presented, in any fashion, supports this assumption in any way. There is no evidence that Liberals do not make fine teachers in general and it is frankly insulting. IF that is the argument you are trying to make.
------------
In conclusion, if you are attempting to forward an argument different from the one I have gathered from your posts, feel free to inform me what that argument
is.
2 thoughts:
1st, you are aware that the subjects in which Liberals are so prevalent are
known as the Liberal Arts? How prevalent, Fox, are the Conservative professors in the Conservative Arts: Business?
2nd, you never answered me if you've actually read the
www.newamericancentury.org website. And if you are familiar with those who run it. Are you?
Cheers to all
Cycloptichorn
