My own personal experience in the Netherlands did not show one specific bias, but rather multiple groups within the same university with different convictions. There was a group of people/professors who insisted that people were rational and markets efficient, and then there was the ‘people are crazy and the world is mad’ crowd. I actually really liked that people held these discussions, made it much more interesting and reduced bias overall I think.
In terms of social issues, I never noticed much discussion about this. People were usually pretty open and tolerant to any ideas, if it wasn’t too extreme. The exception was during the debating club where any and all rhetorical tricks were considered okay.
I do remember some instances where professors were fired/persecuted for professing the “wrong” beliefs, but that was a while ago now. For example, my uncle was not allowed to say that Jewish people were more likely to have diabetes and that medical students should take this into account. Also, there was a scientist who was hounded in the media for 40 years because he said that crime had a large genetic component, until recently when people suddenly went “oops looks like he was right after all, how about that”.
My own personal experience in the Netherlands did not show one specific bias, but rather multiple groups within the same university with different convictions. There was a group of people/professors who insisted that people were rational and markets efficient, and then there was the ‘people are crazy and the world is mad’ crowd. I actually really liked that people held these discussions, made it much more interesting and reduced bias overall I think.
In terms of social issues, I never noticed much discussion about this. People were usually pretty open and tolerant to any ideas, if it wasn’t too extreme. The exception was during the debating club where any and all rhetorical tricks were considered okay.
I do remember some instances where professors were fired/persecuted for professing the “wrong” beliefs, but that was a while ago now. For example, my uncle was not allowed to say that Jewish people were more likely to have diabetes and that medical students should take this into account. Also, there was a scientist who was hounded in the media for 40 years because he said that crime had a large genetic component, until recently when people suddenly went “oops looks like he was right after all, how about that”.
Thanks. I appreciate the additional point of view and observations.