I don’t see the trend reversing unless the economics of higher education change.
How is the economics of higher education causing the trend? Have you written about this anywhere? I’ve been trying to understand the underlying dynamics that’s driving the leftward trend in academia and have not been able to find much online. (The same trend exists in journalism, K-12 education, etc., but that could perhaps all be explained by academia producing graduates who are increasingly left-wing.) It seems like while LessWrong has been trying to “raise the sanity waterline”, the bigger trend in society is increasing bias (towards the political left, especially among elites), which I think we should probably pay more attention to, because it seems likely to affect our x-risk efforts sooner or later. (Arguably it already is.)
As the left have taken over most colleges, I think that only thing that could stop them would be if colleges faced tremendous economic pressure because, say, online education or drastic cuts in government funds threatened the financial position of the colleges and they were forced to become more customer oriented, more oriented to producing scientific gains or to enhancing the future income of their students. Right now, elite colleges especially are in a very comfortable financial position and so face no pressure to take actions their leaders would consider distasteful which would include becoming more open to non-leftist views. I haven’t written on this.
I agree with you on x-risks. I think one of our best paths to avoiding them would be to use genetic engineering to create very smart and moral people, but most of academia hates the possibility that genes could have anything to do with intelligence or morality.
I’ve been trying to understand the underlying dynamics that’s driving the leftward trend in academia and have not been able to find much online.
Since I wrote that, I came across Why Are Professors Liberal? with Neil Gross
(a talk based on his 2013 book) which presents evidence that at least as of 2013, professors were mostly liberal due to self-selection: liberals tended to see academia as a suitable career choice more than conservatives (possibly due to some historically contingent reasons which then became self-reinforcing).
But since that book/video was released, the leftward trend in academia has accelerated, which I still haven’t found a great explanation for, but my guess is that it’s due to a combination of (1) increasing virtue signaling makes academia seem even less suitable for those who aren’t left leaning and (2) more explicit or barely concealed discrimination based on ideology.
My economics department is hiring a macroeconomist this year. A huge number of applicants are submitting statements of teaching and diversity in which they describe how if hired they will promote diversity in their teaching.
How is the economics of higher education causing the trend? Have you written about this anywhere? I’ve been trying to understand the underlying dynamics that’s driving the leftward trend in academia and have not been able to find much online. (The same trend exists in journalism, K-12 education, etc., but that could perhaps all be explained by academia producing graduates who are increasingly left-wing.) It seems like while LessWrong has been trying to “raise the sanity waterline”, the bigger trend in society is increasing bias (towards the political left, especially among elites), which I think we should probably pay more attention to, because it seems likely to affect our x-risk efforts sooner or later. (Arguably it already is.)
As the left have taken over most colleges, I think that only thing that could stop them would be if colleges faced tremendous economic pressure because, say, online education or drastic cuts in government funds threatened the financial position of the colleges and they were forced to become more customer oriented, more oriented to producing scientific gains or to enhancing the future income of their students. Right now, elite colleges especially are in a very comfortable financial position and so face no pressure to take actions their leaders would consider distasteful which would include becoming more open to non-leftist views. I haven’t written on this.
I agree with you on x-risks. I think one of our best paths to avoiding them would be to use genetic engineering to create very smart and moral people, but most of academia hates the possibility that genes could have anything to do with intelligence or morality.
Since I wrote that, I came across Why Are Professors Liberal? with Neil Gross (a talk based on his 2013 book) which presents evidence that at least as of 2013, professors were mostly liberal due to self-selection: liberals tended to see academia as a suitable career choice more than conservatives (possibly due to some historically contingent reasons which then became self-reinforcing).
But since that book/video was released, the leftward trend in academia has accelerated, which I still haven’t found a great explanation for, but my guess is that it’s due to a combination of (1) increasing virtue signaling makes academia seem even less suitable for those who aren’t left leaning and (2) more explicit or barely concealed discrimination based on ideology.
My economics department is hiring a macroeconomist this year. A huge number of applicants are submitting statements of teaching and diversity in which they describe how if hired they will promote diversity in their teaching.