We want people to learn new things, so we have conferences where people can present their research. But who to invite? There are so many people, many of whom have never done any studies. Luckily for us, we have a body of people that spend their lives researching and checking each otherās research: Academia. Still, there are many academics, and thereās only so many time slots you can assign before youāre filled up; ideally, weād be representative. So now the question becomes: why was the choice made to spend so many of the limited time slots on āscientific racistsā, which is a position thatās virtually universally rejected by professional researchers, while topics like āsocialismā, which has a ton of support in academia (e.g., the latest philpapers survey found that when asked about their politics, a majority of philosophers selected āsocialismā and only a minority selected ācapitalismā or āotherā), tend to get little to no time allotted to them at these conferences?
I agree with the point your actually making here-namely that people invite racists but not socialists because they like racism better than socialism or other alternative viewpoints that they could invite people with, but I do have a nitpick:
While Iād much rather have (most, non-Stalinist) socialists than scientific racists, Iād say economists are the most relevant experts for economics, and they seem to be down on socialism, except maybe some non-mainstream market variants. Although I guess other social scientists also have relevant expertise and more of them are socialists I think? Insofar as philosophers are expressing reasonably high confidence in socialism by picking it in the philpapers survey even when ādonāt knowā is also an option, yet among economists socialism is (I think?) quite fringe, I feel like this is the kind of anti science/āempiricism arrogance that philosophers are often accused of, usually quite unfairly. But then I am not a socialist.
and they seem to be down on socialism, except maybe some non-mainstream market variants.
I did try to find a survey for sociology, political science, and economics, not only today but also when I was writing my post on market socialism (I too wondered whether economists are more in favor of market socialism), but I couldnāt really find one. My guess is that the first two would be more pro-socialism and the last more anti, although it probably also differs from country to country depending on their history of academia (e.g. whether they had a red scare in academia or not).
I feel like this is the kind of anti science/āempiricism arrogance that philosophers are often accused of
This is probably partly because of the different things theyāre researching. Economics tends to look at things that are easier to quantify, like GDP and material goods created, which capitalism is really good at, while philosophers tend to look at things that capitalism seems to be less good at, like alienation, which is harder to quantify (though proxies like depression, suicide and loneliness do seem to be increasing).
Not to mention, they might agree on the data but disagree on what to value. Rust & Schwitzgebel (2013) did a survey of philosophy professors specializing in ethics, philosophy professors not specializing in ethics, and non-philosophy professors. 60% of ethicists felt eating meat was wrong, while just under 45% of non-ethicists agreed, and only 19.6% of non-philosophers thought so. I personally think one of the strongest arguments against capitalism is the existence of factory farms. With such numbers, it seems plausible that while an average economist might think of the meat industry as a positive, the average philosopher might think of it as a negative (thinking something akin to this post).
I donāt see why weād expect less factory farms under socialism, except via us being poorer in general. And I feel like āmake everything worse for humans to make things better for animalsā feels a bit ācartoon utilitarian super-villainā, even if Iām not sure what is wrong with it. Itās also not why socialists support socialism, even if many are also pro-animal. On the other hand, if socialism worked as intended, why would factory farming decrease?
Let me try to steelman this:
We want people to learn new things, so we have conferences where people can present their research. But who to invite? There are so many people, many of whom have never done any studies.
Luckily for us, we have a body of people that spend their lives researching and checking each otherās research: Academia. Still, there are many academics, and thereās only so many time slots you can assign before youāre filled up; ideally, weād be representative.
So now the question becomes: why was the choice made to spend so many of the limited time slots on āscientific racistsā, which is a position thatās virtually universally rejected by professional researchers, while topics like āsocialismā, which has a ton of support in academia (e.g., the latest philpapers survey found that when asked about their politics, a majority of philosophers selected āsocialismā and only a minority selected ācapitalismā or āotherā), tend to get little to no time allotted to them at these conferences?
I agree with the point your actually making here-namely that people invite racists but not socialists because they like racism better than socialism or other alternative viewpoints that they could invite people with, but I do have a nitpick:
While Iād much rather have (most, non-Stalinist) socialists than scientific racists, Iād say economists are the most relevant experts for economics, and they seem to be down on socialism, except maybe some non-mainstream market variants. Although I guess other social scientists also have relevant expertise and more of them are socialists I think? Insofar as philosophers are expressing reasonably high confidence in socialism by picking it in the philpapers survey even when ādonāt knowā is also an option, yet among economists socialism is (I think?) quite fringe, I feel like this is the kind of anti science/āempiricism arrogance that philosophers are often accused of, usually quite unfairly. But then I am not a socialist.
I did try to find a survey for sociology, political science, and economics, not only today but also when I was writing my post on market socialism (I too wondered whether economists are more in favor of market socialism), but I couldnāt really find one. My guess is that the first two would be more pro-socialism and the last more anti, although it probably also differs from country to country depending on their history of academia (e.g. whether they had a red scare in academia or not).
This is probably partly because of the different things theyāre researching. Economics tends to look at things that are easier to quantify, like GDP and material goods created, which capitalism is really good at, while philosophers tend to look at things that capitalism seems to be less good at, like alienation, which is harder to quantify (though proxies like depression, suicide and loneliness do seem to be increasing).
Not to mention, they might agree on the data but disagree on what to value. Rust & Schwitzgebel (2013) did a survey of philosophy professors specializing in ethics, philosophy professors not specializing in ethics, and non-philosophy professors. 60% of ethicists felt eating meat was wrong, while just under 45% of non-ethicists agreed, and only 19.6% of non-philosophers thought so. I personally think one of the strongest arguments against capitalism is the existence of factory farms. With such numbers, it seems plausible that while an average economist might think of the meat industry as a positive, the average philosopher might think of it as a negative (thinking something akin to this post).
I donāt see why weād expect less factory farms under socialism, except via us being poorer in general. And I feel like āmake everything worse for humans to make things better for animalsā feels a bit ācartoon utilitarian super-villainā, even if Iām not sure what is wrong with it. Itās also not why socialists support socialism, even if many are also pro-animal. On the other hand, if socialism worked as intended, why would factory farming decrease?