# Science is under attack from the right AND left **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 30, 2019, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751 "2019-05-30T02:08:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/1 "2019-05-30T02:08:29Z")
> **[Self-Censorship on Campus Is Bad for Science](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/05/self-censorship-campus-bad-science/589969/)** > > Amid heightened tensions on college campuses, well-established scientific ideas are suddenly meeting with stiff political resistance. > [@](#): > > To my surprise, some students even objected to other well-established biological concepts, such as “kin selection,” the idea that, when individuals take actions for the benefit of their offspring and siblings, they are indirectly perpetuating their own genes. Startled students, falling into what we call the “naturalistic fallacy”—the notion that what occurs in nature is good—thought I was actually endorsing Trump’s hiring of his family! Things have gone so far that, in my classes, I now feel compelled to issue a caveat: Just because a trait has evolved by natural selection does not mean that it is also morally desirable. > > The duty of scientists is to study the world—including the human body and mind—as it is. Some of our students, however, are seeing only what they want to see and denying real-world phenomena that conflict with their ideology. Used to be, you mainly saw this with a few ultra-Christian kids who took issue with evolution. But ironically, it now seems to be much more prevalent to see students resistant to studying human evolution because of left wing political correctness. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/2 "2019-05-30T02:56:54Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Used to be, you mainly saw this with a few ultra-Christian kids who took issue with evolution. But ironically, it now seems to be much more prevalent to see students resistant to studying human evolution because of left wing political correctness. :dubious: Cite for the “much more prevalent” bit? The link in your OP is an opinion piece consisting of the assertions of **one** biology professor about the attitudes of “some” students, unsupported by any quantitative data (or any evidence at all except the author’s anecdotal account). ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/3 "2019-05-30T03:15:49Z")
I don’t have to provide a cite for “seems”. I can however furnish many more accounts (anecdata, if you prefer) of professors who have gotten complaints that are political correctness type concerns. Some have even been driven out of their jobs, while others talk about self-censoring out of fear of being next. Can you show examples of the same thing happening because of complaints from right wing students? (Let’s agree to stipulate that Bob Jones or Liberty University and the like don’t count.) That said, I meant it in the thread title: attacks on science definitely also come from the right! But I don’t see that as coming, by and large, from college students. (Instead, it comes from the current presidential administration. :smack:) It’s the left, where I reside, that really ought to know better. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/4 "2019-05-30T03:41:19Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > I don’t have to provide a cite for “seems”. No, but if one op-ed by one professor containing unsupported assertions about the attitudes of “some” students causes you to leap to the conclusion that anti-evolution views are now **“much more prevalent”** (emphasis added) among “left wing” students than among Christian-fundamentalist ones, then your “seem” gauge could use some recalibrating. > [@SlackerInc](#): > > I can however furnish many more accounts (anecdata, if you prefer) of professors who have gotten complaints that are political correctness type concerns. Sure, it’s a perennial conservative talking point how left-wing “political correctness” is destroying the freedom of ideas on campus. Several of their favorite scare stories about it have been [debunked on these boards](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=21118192&postcount=68) from time to time. While it’s always possible to find clickbait anecdotes of earnest young people on campus temporarily overreacting to things they don’t like, [actual research on student attitudes](http://theconversation.com/does-college-turn-people-into-liberals-90905) suggests that the college experience in fact tends to make students **more** open-minded, not less: > [@](#): > > The IDEALS study started following students when they entered college in 2015. Data on many topics, including tracking how students’ attitudes toward liberals and conservatives changed, were then gathered from the same students during their second year of college. […] > > In our nationally representative sample of over 7,000 undergraduates at more than 120 colleges […] [a]mong all students, 48 percent viewed liberals more favorably in their second year of college than when they arrived on campus. However, among the same students, 50 percent also viewed conservatives more favorably. In other words, college attendance is associated, on average, with gains in appreciating political viewpoints across the spectrum, not just favoring liberals. […] > > The data show 31 percent of students did develop more negative attitudes toward conservatives. However, just about the same amount, 30 percent, developed more negative attitudes toward liberals. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/5 "2019-05-30T03:48:03Z")
Apples and oranges. The issue here isn’t what the experience is for the majority, even the vast majority, of students. There may be super left wing colleges where these PC “woke” types are the majority, but even there I doubt it. What they are is a super dedicated, extremely antagonistic minority who support each other nationwide on Twitter, and are troublesome enough to put the fear of God into university administrators even if their percentages among the student population probably are in the low single digits. (Their power in this regard is, of course, massively amplified if they are young women of color.) And the professors I’m hearing from are NOT conservatives–although some idiots classify people like Nicholas and Erika Christakis as such, simply because their antagonists are left wing students. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/6 "2019-05-30T04:00:53Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > The issue here isn’t what the experience is for the majority, even the vast majority, of students. Then what was the point of your (erroneous) claim that anti-evolution attitudes are “much more prevalent” among liberal college students than among fundamentalist Christian ones? If all you’re trying to say is that there are **some** college students, of whatever political persuasion, who have some ignorant and stupid notions, well, that’s not exactly a profound insight. _“The man who invented the cuckoo clock is dead. This is old news, but good!”_ ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/7 "2019-05-30T04:17:39Z")
Maybe I should have added more caveats in the OP, but I have added them since then and will continue to do so, in the push and pull of the discussion. I’m not saying “a higher percentage of college students nationwide are ‘woke’ activists than are devout Creationists”. I don’t know if that’s true, but I’d guess probably not. However, I would say the following about the latter group: –They are much more likely to concentrate at the aforementioned “crazy Christian” schools (just as, BTW, you won’t find a lot of the “woke” types at technical or vocational schools, or commuter type colleges). –If they do attend normal, secular four year universities, they are not likely to make a stink about their Creationist views. They knew that was what they were getting into by attending a secular school, and they would have attended Liberty or the like if they wanted to avoid it. –If by some chance a holy roller student did actually go complain to the administration, they’d be laughed out of the office–or, more accurately, would get a polite and noncommital brushoff. So what I really meant by “much more prevalent” is something like: “Nowadays, a science instructor who teaches gen ed classes dealing with evolution at a secular, mainstream university has to worry much more about getting put on the hot seat by ‘woke’ progressive students than by conservative/evangelical ones.” Do you dispute that? ETA: I’d also add that the point here is more about professors/instructors and their ever more precarious position in their jobs–which they may have had for decades, and presumably hope to continue to hold for years to come–than the experience of going to college for GenY kids in 2019. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/8 "2019-05-30T04:25:24Z")
By and large it’s the political right that accounts for most attacks on climate science, etc. The only attacks from the left that I’ve seen on science are gender/sex distinctions, and a few fringe woo/therapy types. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/9 "2019-05-30T04:48:22Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > By and large it’s the political right that accounts for most attacks on climate science, etc. Absolutely. Just upthread, I wrote: > [@SlackerInc](#): > > I meant it in the thread title: attacks on science definitely also come from the right! But I don’t see that as coming, by and large, from college students. (Instead, it comes from the current presidential administration. :smack:) It’s the left, where I reside, that really ought to know better. And of course it’s not just the current administration, but Dubya’s as well, not to mention Republicans in the House, Senate, governor’s mansions, state legislatures, and local school boards. But our side is supposed to be the pro-science side. It’s our brand, or should be. So we need to hold ourselves to a higher standard. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/10 "2019-05-30T05:19:24Z")
There’s a distinction between being “anti-” evolution and just having some misconceptions about it. The latter is common and basically always has been. Particularly when the concept is applied to Homo sapiens, because we are something of a special case. And I know even saying that will upset some, because of the religious baggage and the prominence of the “we think we’re special, but we’re not” philosophy…to some, its really important to emphasize that we are not special. But I just mean that technology and society complicate matters, and often make straightforward extrapolations / inferences from natural selection principles impossible. Sent from my Redmi 5A using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/11 "2019-05-30T05:25:54Z")
Right. This is something Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker often try to point out: that even if we have deep-rooted, evolved behavioral tendencies, we are able to use rationality and civilization to fight or suppress some of those impulses. And that’s a good thing. But that part of their argument tends to be ignored by some (sadly, most often in sociology, the field both my wife and mother have graduate degrees in), and they are strawmanned as telling “just so stories” that somehow justify rape, subjugation of women, racism, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/12 "2019-05-30T05:30:53Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > However, I would say the following about the latter group: > > –They are much more likely to concentrate at the aforementioned “crazy Christian” schools (just as, BTW, you won’t find a lot of the “woke” types at technical or vocational schools, or commuter type colleges). It’s true that it’s very unlikely to find left-wing activists at fundamentalist Christian colleges, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t large numbers of fundamentalist Christian students at non-Christian schools. As [this article](https://slate.com/technology/2015/05/creationism-and-evolution-in-school-religious-students-cant-learn-natural-selection.html) describes, > [@](#): > > Leslie Rissler is an evolutionary ecologist and biogeographer who taught an upper-level evolution course for biology majors for more than 10 years at the University of Alabama. […] her research addressing evolution education [was] published online last fall in Evolution: Education and Outreach. […] > > Rissler examined data from questionnaires completed by 2,999 students from the University of Alabama. […] Rissler concluded that deeply religious students are less likely to either understand or accept evolution than are their less religious peers. “The more religious are less scientifically literate,” she said. “The data are clear on this. It’s just that people don’t like to hear it.” (I’m also not convinced that there aren’t substantial numbers of progressive students at community and vocational colleges, especially among poorer urban student populations, but I’d need to see some data to draw conclusions.) > [@SlackerInc](#): > > So what I really meant by “much more prevalent” is something like: “Nowadays, a science instructor who teaches gen ed classes dealing with evolution at a secular, mainstream university has to worry much more about getting put on the hot seat by ‘woke’ progressive students than by conservative/evangelical ones.” Do you dispute that? Well, it seems to be contradicted by, for example, the account in [this Scientific American article](https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/what-should-teachers-say-to-religious-students-who-doubt-evolution/?redirect=1) by a professor at Stevens Institute of Technology, which AFAICT is about as “secular and mainstream” as higher education gets: > [@](#): > > I’m teaching Darwin again this semester, in two separate courses, and I’m confronted with a familiar dilemma: How should I respond to students who reject evolutionary theory on religious grounds? […] > > I asked both classes to write a paper on the following question: Why do you think Darwin’s theory of evolution still encounters so much opposition today? […] > > “The reason Darwin encounters so much opposition today is due to proof as well as logic.” > > “Evolution has all these different theories and drawbacks, whereas the Bible is simple (parsimonious)… There is a creator. There is a God.” > > “I don’t mind believing in evolution, but the only part I refuse to believe in is that man evolved from apes… Regardless of the facts that science presents to the world I will believe that God exists and what is in the Bible is the truth.” > > How do I respond to students like this? […] I feel a bit queasy, I admit, challenging their faith, from which some of them derive great comfort. Part of me agrees with one student who wrote: “Each individual is entitled to his or her own religious beliefs… Authority figures teaching America’s youth should not be permitted to say certain things such as any religion being simply ‘wrong’ due to a certain scientific explanation.” On the other hand, if I don’t prod these young people into questioning their most cherished beliefs, I’m not doing my job, am I? Another college professor at the “secular, mainstream” University of Washington similarly [recounts having to deal with his students’ resistance to facts about evolution that conflict with their faith](https://strangenotions.com/god-professors-and-evolutionary-biology-classes/): > [@](#): > > Professor David P. Barash recently wrote an opinion column in the New York Times titled “God, Darwin and My College Biology Class.” Professor Barash is in the psychology department at the University of Washington. He teaches courses on sociobiology. […] He says: > > "It’s irresponsible to teach biology without evolution, and yet many students worry about reconciling their beliefs with evolutionary science. […] > > Until recently, I had pretty much ignored such discomfort, assuming that it was their problem, not mine. […] But instead of students’ growing more comfortable with the tension between evolution and religion over time, the opposite seems to have happened." So college students, even at secular institutions, voicing anti-evolution attitudes based on religious science-denialism rather than liberal “wokeness” seems to be much more common than you imagine. And this phenomenon is apparently [not unique to the US](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/feb/21/religion.highereducation): > [@](#): > > Academics fight rise of creationism at universities > > A growing number of science students on British campuses and in sixth form colleges are challenging the theory of evolution and arguing that Darwin was wrong. Some are being failed in university exams because they quote sayings from the Bible or Qur’an as scientific fact […] > > Most of the next generation of medical and science students could well be creationists, according to a biology teacher at a leading London sixth-form college. “The vast majority of my students now believe in creationism,” she said, “and these are thinking young people who are able and articulate and not at the dim end at all. They have extensive booklets on creationism which they put in my pigeon-hole … it’s a bit like the southern states of America.” Many of them came from Muslim, Pentecostal or Baptist family backgrounds, she said, and were intending to become pharmacists, doctors, geneticists and neuro-scientists. > [@Mijin](#): > > There’s a distinction between being “anti-” evolution and just having some misconceptions about it. Exactly. ISTM that what **SlackerInc** is referring to as “getting put on the hot seat by ‘woke’ progressive students” probably boils down to some students initially not understanding the differences between actual evolutionary biology and a lot of wrongheaded popular notions about allegedly “innate” racial and gender differences, and therefore pushing back against the former under the impression that they’re being taught the latter. No, I’m not convinced that this is more prevalent, even in “secular, mainstream” institutions, than religious students pushing back against evolution for faith-based reasons. Nor do I think that it’s worth clutching our pearls over as a dangerous “left-wing attack on science”. Of course, I definitely agree that college professors need to explain to students clearly and unambiguously what the actual facts of evolutionary biology are, and how scientists properly investigate and justify their inferences from those facts, and how their theories differ from unscientific claims about human development—whether those claims are religious in nature or just pseudoscientific bullshit spouted by people who claim to be pro-science. And of course, we can support those professors in their task by not spreading or encouraging all the pseudoscientific bullshit about so-called “race realism” and essentialist gender norms and so forth that naive students are apt to confuse with genuine biology. Naive students are right to be wary about the ubiquitous pop-science nonsense that racists and sexists use to give a sciencey-looking gloss to their bigotry. What they need help with is understanding how this pop-science nonsense differs from actual science. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/13 "2019-05-30T06:05:07Z")
A large proportion of college students are sophomoric by definition. I’ve heard dumber things uttered by smart students when I was in college. The threat to science is not that students don’t get things. It is from parents and politicians not getting things. If a dumb student tried to escalate the issues in the OP, how many parents and left wing politicians would stand behind them. Not many. If, on the other hand, a fundamentalist student lashed out at the teaching of godless evolution, he or she would get a lot more support. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/14 "2019-05-30T07:03:57Z")
Hard disagree. Speaking of which, that was all very interesting, Kimstu (sincerely); but I notice you didn’t address my third and IMO most important bullet point: > [@SlackerInc](#): > > –If by some chance a holy roller student did actually go complain to the administration, they’d be laughed out of the office–or, more accurately, would get a polite and noncommital brushoff. No one’s going to get any traction with a university administration complaining that their biology teacher contradicts their Creationist views. But let’s go back to the Atlantic op-ed for examples of the kind of thing that (as Larry Summers’s experience proved) absolutely can get professors in hot water: > [@](#): > > The duty of scientists is to study the world—including the human body and mind—as it is. Some of our students, however, are seeing only what they want to see and denying real-world phenomena that conflict with their ideology. Take, for example, the obvious biological differences between the sexes, not only in physical traits (men, on average, are clearly stronger and faster than women are), but also in aptitudes and preferences (boys generally prefer wheeled toys, and girls prefer plush toys, a preference that is also observed in baby monkeys!). > > People expect an equal sex ratio across academic professions and sometimes ascribe the lack of such equality to bias. In the so-called STEM fields—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—the relative paucity of women is frequently taken to reflect endemic sexism. While this is undoubtedly a factor, the effect of bias as opposed to other factors, such as differences in what male and female students prefer, requires detailed empirical study. > > One set of data challenges the idea that bias is the only cause of sex-ratio differences in the STEM fields. The so-called gender-equality paradox involves the observation that, while women and men around the world perform equally well on standardized science tests, countries with the highest proportion of women in STEM are not the ones with the least discrimination or sexual harassment, but those with the greatest gender inequality. Where women are free to choose their own path and do not have to worry about pay, they gravitate toward the humanities. Countries such as Norway and Finland have relatively few women in STEM fields, while countries such as Algeria and Indonesia have an ample supply. > > However, when one assumes that everyone is a blank slate, differences between what males and females do can be explained only by bias and harassment. The conclusion is obvious: All STEM fields are cesspools of sex discrimination. This is what happens when ideology replaces biology. It’s become taboo to even mention the possibility that men and women might have different preferences. How many professors will fearlessly talk about stuff like this to undergrad gen-ed courses (that is, not aimed at science majors)? How many of those who will do it have tenure (an increasingly rare attribute among instructors)? ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/15 "2019-05-30T11:20:40Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > A large proportion of college students are sophomoric by definition. I’ve heard dumber things uttered by smart students when I was in college. > The threat to science is not that students don’t get things. It is from parents and politicians not getting things. If a dumb student tried to escalate the issues in the OP, how many parents and left wing politicians would stand behind them. Not many. > If, on the other hand, a fundamentalist student lashed out at the teaching of godless evolution, he or she would get a lot more support. Exactly. It’s not earth-shattering that 20-year-olds are given to believing bullshit. Only in college can you find students who believe everything that Ayn Rand espoused sitting right next to students are believe anything that remotely resembles cultural appropriation is racist and thus wrong. Eventually both extremists grow out of these views as they learn critical thinking skills and learn to divorce their understanding of the world from the understanding of their parents and friends. I doubt that college student wackjobbery is worse than it was in the past, but if it is, social media is probably to blame. At any rate, having doubts about kin selection is a different kind of scientific skepticism than having doubts about, say, climate change, the efficacy of vaccines, or the historical reality of evolution. I’m an ecologist by training and took a fair amount of courses in evolution in grad school and I’m a big time biological determinist, and I’m also skeptical about the applicability of a number of ecological and evolution theories–many which are based on non-human models–to humans. Furthermore, evolutionary psychology is rife with untested/untestable speculations and hypotheses that appeal to folks with a certain agenda. So it makes sense for students to be more skeptical (even if their skepticism is a bit shrill and overwrought) of this area of study than other scientific fields. Not all science is the same. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/16 "2019-05-30T11:22:57Z")
There is nothing new here. For the vast majority of people science is just some answers on standardized tests. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/17 "2019-05-30T11:38:05Z")
Science should always be under attack… from other scientists. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/18 "2019-05-30T13:55:16Z")
So what’s the p-value on “both sides do it, too!” ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/19 "2019-05-30T14:08:11Z")
It’s a sign of the uneducated, ignorant and superstitious among us. ---
**Author:** ![Grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b782af/32.png) [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2019, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/20 "2019-05-30T14:31:43Z")
I’m trying to figure out why an instructor would be surprised that she has to educate students. This whole “they objected to my statement” is precisely what is going to happen. Was she under the impression the kids were going to be empty vessels? Now if the kids refuse to be educated on the merits of evolutionary theory or statistical inference then sure object away but that’s not what I took from the article. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751.md?page=2)