My housemates are dear old friends of mine and also as liberal as I am conservative. I've noticed our different approaches to solving problems. When a problem is identified, they discuss how to solve it, the most environmentally pure way to solve it, other alternative solutions. The six-year old weighs in. Discussions can continue for months, with the problem getting worse and worse. Finally, when it can be ignored no longer, a hasty stopgap remedy is introduced and the problem recedes for awhile. As for myself, when I identify a problem I solve it in the most economical and effecient way possible, with a nod towards environmentalism, if practical. With the problem solved, I retire to the den for a cold one. I think my household is a neat little microcosm of the differences between liberals and conservatives.

Governor --

I would highly recommend you read:

The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation As a Basis for Social Policy by Thomas Sowell

I have not found a more cogent and comprehensive way to explain the differences in the way liberals ("the annointed") see the world compared to conservatives ("the benighted"). Have your housemates read it as well.

It's on order now; thanks for the reccomendation!

It's kind of funny that the years I've spent living with them have done more to cement my conservative beliefs than anything else.

"...leftists and their scientific allies..."

If one reads this blog long enough, one can easily reach the conclusion that some distant time ago a scientist - probably a leftist as well - ran over Peter Burnet's new puppy. The anti-science screeds he contributes here become ever more shrill and ridiculous; they are on an exact parallel with similar musings by leftists that paint pictures of the conservative ruling class rubbing their hands in eager anticipation of all the starvation and misery their economic policies will create. Honestly, do you really believe that leftists as a group have no interest in "solving problems?" Do you refuse to acknowledge that, whether wrong or right, at least some, if not most, "leftists" are just as interested in "improving the lot of humans?"

As for "Governor Breck," if you can get past patting yourself on the back for a few moments, you might try and analyze the equation of your housemates' personality traits and their political persuasion. Do they necessarily go together, or does the former simply predispose them to the latter? Using the same reasoning, one could make a similar equation between racism and conservative Republicanism, if one wished - I mean, how _do_ Klan members vote these days, anyway?

M. -

Given the state of the educational establishment in the West, it is incumbent upon you to prove that the left WANTS to solve, or even work, the situation.

It's like the old "Peanuts" line (by Lucy): "I love humanity, it's people I can't stand".

The caricature of a limousine liberal is not without good merit. Just ask Mary Landreiu (or Arlen Specter).

M. -

I don't know the Governor's housemates, but my life experience leads me to think that if they are young chaps, their personality traits have led them to their liberalism. If they are Ted Kennedy, Hillary Clinton, Jesse Jackson, Tom Daschle, etc., their liberalism forces them to pretend they have a personality to match.

Fortunately for the Governor, a lot of the analysis you recommend he does on his housemates has already been done by economists like Mr. Sowell. His books and my life experiences have convinced me that there is a worldview around which liberals coalesce, and it is different from that conservatives coalesce around. It is centered on over-identifying problems (everything is a problem, never a condition), and delivering first stage (instead of long-term), feel good (this is key) "solutions" (instead of "settling" for trade-offs).

Your comments on the linkage between conservatism and racism (and even Klan voting patterns) is of course a slogan, not an argument. For a decisely different take on conservatism and the politics of race...again, you can't do better than Mr. Sowell.

M. Bulger

I don't know about Klan members, but one ex-klan member has this to say Anybody but Bush by David Duke

"Given the state of the educational establishment in the West, it is incumbent upon you to prove that the left WANTS to solve, or even work, the situation."

I have to admit that I really don't know what you're talking about here, or why the state of the Western educational establishment comes into it, but is there not some sense in which it is incumbent upon the right to prove that it "WANTS" to solve the "situation," vs. that it simply wants to make a quick buck and pass on the detritus to the next generation? That is, given the state of the political and business establishments in the West, which exert several orders of magnitude more influence over "the situation" than the educational establishment. Works both ways.

"I love humanity, it's people I can't stand"

That's a conservative line, not a liberal one, isn't it?

"Your comments on the linkage between conservatism and racism (and even Klan voting patterns) is of course a slogan, not an argument."

Well, yes. That was the point. And while I haven't read Mr. Sowell's book, I have read enough of him to know that he is just as condescending as his targets, albeit in a different way.

Whew! Talk about condescending.

The educational establishment IS the chief non-family influence for almost every child in the public schools in the USA.

If you want to consign the poorest children in the worst neighborhoods to "the bigotry of NO expectations", then be my guest. But don't dare to imply that liberals do more to improve the lot of humanity. That is a self-referential lie.

I will leave alone your comment that the right is interested in solving social/political problems only to the extent they can be exploited.

However, there is an effective answer: Let Freedom Ring!

M

The post and the site are about ideas and where they lead, not characters. Sure, there are plenty of well-meaning leftists and misanthropic conservatives, but that is not the point. The criticisms of scientists are barbed because I know of no other profession that so predictably cloaks itself in the mantle of disinterested truth, distances itself from any responsibility for the consequences of its work and reacts with such sanctimonious outrage when anyone suggests they and their work are anything less than an unadulterated boon for mankind for which they merit continuous honour and praise. Not even doctors, notoriously defensive and thin-skinned, are so pompous.

Think of many of the political/scientific issues we discuss around here--environmentalism, poverty, resources, AIDS, etc. and you will see a pattern. First, the issue is quickly and inevitably defined as "global", which effectively comes to mean it it soluble only in theory and that efforts to tackle the issue locally or nationally are sidelined. Sure, lots of valiant types may still slug on at those levels, but the attention and sex appeal is in international networks, conferences, resolutions and "comprehensive strategies". So is the clout and applause. The matter is politicized and removed from the critical eyes of dissenters or anyone seeking to challenge them politically or even scientifically.

Secondly, the cause of the problem is always eventually laid at the feet of economic progress. Take AIDS. Here is a 100% preventable disease caused by well-understood behaviour. Where is the AIDS industry these days? Holding international conferences to celebrate sex and ream out drug companies. The leading scientific lights at the UN are thought to be doing their jobs when they do nothing more than say the plague is growing and they need more and more money. No one suggests they be fired for failure, because no one wants the party to stop.

Thirdly, the solution always involves promoting poverty and statism. We know very well how to create wealth and what political and social conditions promote it, yet somehow the progressive/scientific establishment continues to promote collectivist solutions that have no hope of being implemented and would be disastrous if they were. Of the issues I named above, can you think of one where current mainstream scientific thinking points to solutions that will increase the prosperity, welfare or happiness of anybody?

Finally, there is a constant undermining of any and all moral considerations, and a painting of those attempting to navigate the roaky shoals of morality in modern times as contemptuous know-nothings who hate modernity and progress--forces of darkness. Put simply, they and they alone count. Consider Orrin's post on stem cell research a few below this one. My goodness, it is bad enough when we allow the promise of potential disease cures to trump the value of life (I can't count the number of articles on stem cell research, genetic engineering, etc, where the proponent rests his entire case on promising some parents he will bring relief to their tragically-afflicted child if he is only given the green light to do whatever he wants.)When we do so in the name of scientism triumphant, we truly do risk our humanity and our souls. The eugenicists are back, M.

So, I suggest your aim is off if you think I am a Luddite quack questionning the laws of nature. My intent is to keep a dangerously, arrogant and undemocratic political force under the klieg lights. That that force counts lots of decent, well-intentioned types as members is quite true, and quite secondary.

Well said, Peter!

Back to

Peter B:

I appreciate the long and comprehensive response. My very first reaction to it, however, is that if you simply replace "science" with "economic and political elites" and tweak an issue here and there, you'd have a book introduction written by Noam Chomsky. His “dangerously arrogant and undemocratic political forces” are different from yours, but apparently they are engaged in most of the same activities.
I really don’t have the time or energy to address your post point-by-point;
notwithstanding that, there is a certain level at which I agree with you. To take the AIDS example, my superficial take of the “AIDS industry” isn’t far from your own, and in some respects the thirst for public money and the need to maintain existing bureaucracies are root causes. But there are other reasons for an international conference that focuses on “reaming out drug companies.” In the short term, health professionals are interested in saving lives now. Morality might help consign the souls of infected Africans to heaven, but it won’t rid them of an illness they have already contracted. It is only natural and logical to expect them to lobby, or attempt to coerce, drug companies to sacrifice their bottom lines in the interests of saving lives. It is a manifestly pro-life position.
To take one motivating example: worldwide, rates of tuberculosis infection have been increasing for more than a decade (in part due to AIDS). Most tuberculosis is rather easily treated with a well-known and long-known drug. In the interests of combating what should be a perfectly treatable disease, federal money was made available for pharmaceutical companies to make the drug. None would. The profit margin was simply not high enough for any of them, even when they were assured of not losing money. You can perhaps forgive some health professionals, and some scientists, if they fail to see the utility of free-market solutions as a panacea.
If in turn they neglect the long-term benefits of preaching morality, for the most part – however free they may feel to preach to us about diet and exercise and other life habits – it is because they feel that preaching abstinence is not part of their job (although, for my part, I have yet to encounter a “safe sex” presentation that didn’t begin with the truism that the “safest” sex occurs in the context of a stable, monogamous relationship). And whether it is or not, are they to enforce it? I think the line between preaching morality (= abstinence or monogamy) vs. responsibility (= “safe sex”) is broad and fuzzy. Both have their idealistic and practical aspects.
It is unfortunate, but if the modern scientific establishment views modern moralists as “contemptuous know-nothings who hate modernity and progress,” it is only because they have encountered too many who fit that profile. It is the same impulse that drives modern moralists to extrapolate their view of science and scientists from the books of Richard Dawkins, or from that percentage of professional scientists who truly are arrogant and condescending. Those attempting to bridge the gap encounter ridicule from both sides.
I never intended to imply that you are a Luddite quack, but whenever your posts touch on matters scientific, I think they turn vitriolic out of proportion to their targets.

P.S. You ask “Of the issues I named above, can you think of one where current mainstream scientific thinking points to solutions that will increase the prosperity, welfare or happiness of anybody?”

Just as a start: Environmentalism: fisheries management; the scientific contribution to the “green revolution” that has proved Ehrlich-style doomsayers wrong, or at least delayed their predictions--which continues apace with the development of rice with beta-carotene, as one example; controls of industrial pollution, vehicle emissions, etc. that have improved quality of life in countless American communities, etc.

M.

Thanks. We're getting closer. If I understand, your focus is the advances and progress that science, properly understood, have wrought and mine is a political force that has arisen through a corruption of that ideal. Ok, that makes for tough debates, which is why we are here. Of course I rejoice when science conquers a childhood disease or give U.S. forces an unbeatable edge in Iraq. I even like it when it raises my standard of living by inventing a battery twice as powerful at half the cost although, I do note other scientists in the electronic fields are ensuring I must buy far more batteries than anyone ever needed before, but never mind, I have kids). But the issues we debate around here aren't generally those issues. Too many scientists have made a devil's pact with politics and have appropriated the self-ordained right to pronounce upon and claim higher knowledge about every aspect of how we live and think. They are slowly, inexorably, seeking to disenfranchise ordinary folk from having any respectable viewpoint at odds with theirs. One of the items I forgot to mention in my post above was the way the scientific establishments is now relying on inscrutable and inaccessible knowledge on so many political issues. C'mon, what chance has any laymen have forming any opinion on global warming, or the rain forest? "Research shows..." is a lot more effective than good old murderous totalitarianism.

On your specific examples, I will gladly give you the green revolution, which was presumably orchestrated by scientists who ignored all the Club of Rome, UN type political correctness and just got the job done. But not fisheries management, which has destroyed Canada's East Coast Fishery and is so subject to environmental politics as to be a menace. Pollution controls? Yea, ok, sort of.

AIDS, however is a different matter. We know how to treat AIDS, but the political issue is how to halt a plague, not treat a patient. If treating the disease was the issue, the UN and the trendy activists wouldn't be involved at all and it wouldn't be such a hot item. The real objective is to enjoy unrestrained sex in an AIDS free atmosphere.

Finally, my doctor, a very decent but incorrigible leftist, takes six months off every couple of years to go work in an Aids clinic in Southern Africa. Am I impressed? You bet.

Peter:

Very nice post, and thoughtful replies.

I know you will be shocked, but I thought I might offer a little dissent.

While I essentially agree with your point, you do neglect the 'precautionary effect.' That is the thing that has caused me to pay the better part of $100,000 in car and home insurance over the last 30 years, despite the very low likelihood (zero, as it has turned out) of needing it, just in case I might.

With respect to global warming, the precautionary effect argues for doing something definitive now to prevent a thoroughgoing disaster in the future, even if that likelihood isn't particularly high.

Several years ago, The Economist had a pretty thorough study on what to do about Global Warming, and landed on the side of the precautionary approach. However, they noted there was no rush, and that waiting 20 years might well kill two birds with one stone: allow technology to do its thing, while also giving more data points to see how much precaution would be warranted.