All Science Is Politically Influenced; Social Science Is More So

Are the natural sciences as ideologically driven as the social sciences? No, but the extent that the natural sciences are politicized is understated by almost everyone, including many scientists.

Sociologists of science depict the natural sciences as heavily political. See, for instance, Bruno Latour, Science in Action, and Leviathan and the Air-Pump by Shapin and Schaffer.

However, the premise of Thomas Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions and Karl Popper in the Logic of Scientific Discovery is fundamentally right: Natural science does engage in falsification, and their tests are relatively value free, although I do not doubt that the direction in which they go and the subjects that they study are ideologically and governmentally influenced.

The social sciences are primarily ideological. They are not science. Economists are especially narcissistic in this regard. Microeconomic theory is value free, but the rest of economics is to a large degree ideological, especially in the fields of macroeconomics, labor economics, and monetary economics.

The other social sciences are often if not mostly ideological. 

The tax exemption that universities enjoy for social science and humanities instruction should be eliminated unless the same tax exemptions are given to Republican advocacy organizations. That universities are primarily political organizations is seen in the adoption by the humanities, which should be involved in the transmission of our great Western culture, of politicized, social science approaches.

The hard sciences have better justification for public funding, but if government money is to be used for science, Republicans are advised to ensure that Democrats, who dominate universities, are not using the funds for politicized science.  One way to do this is to focus on chemistry, mathematics, molecular biology, medicine, and physics, and to limit (or at least carefully balance) funding for geology, environmental studies, and environmental biology. 

Higher Education Is Drowning in BS

There's a good piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education by someone who says he's independent and unaffiliated but who seems to me to lean somewhat left.  He blames what he calls the BS in higher education for the deterioration of American politics. 

A good example of the deterioration is Trump's recent claim that Africa and Haiti are "shit holes" and that America needs immigrants from Norway. Trump misses that Norway is richer than the US (Norway GDP per capita, $71,000; US GDP per capita, $56,000) and that most Americans would be better off immigrating to Norway rather than the other way around. 

After 47 years of Fed-led wealth redistribution to the wealthy and stagnant real wages, Americans are falling behind economically, and Trump is not the cure. Although he's better than redistributionists like Obama and Clinton, he is part of the problem; he is not part of the solution.

The author, Notre Dame professor Christian Smith's, assault on academic commercialization, the culture of offense, and publish or perish is a well-taken step in the right direction for the usually educationist Chronicle. 

Rural Sectionalism and the Election of Donald Trump

A December 29  Wall Street Journal piece shows 20 charts that indicate how badly rural Americans have fared. The election of Donald Trump, mostly by rural voters, can be interpreted to be a reaction, and the campaign to eliminate the Electoral College a counterreaction.

Inflation-adjusted household income has declined since 2000, and it has declined the most in rural areas. Much of the decline occurred during the Obama years. That contrasts with the stock market, which has received massive public subsidization. 

Those who foot the bill for "too-big-to-fail" banks are the same people who are dying at increasing rates.

Where I live, Olive, NY, New York City has long played an imperialistic role similar to that of any Roman-style power. It has done so to procure virtually free water; it chose to go the imperial route rather than purchase water ethically back in the 19th century.

In his book Empire of Water, David Soll outlines the 100-year history of theft, exploitation, and regulatory caprice that deprived the ancestors of many people I see each day of their homes and businesses, forcing many who had owned family businesses into becoming day laborers.

Environmentalists, dominant in the Democratic Party, have learned from New York City and since the 1990s have systematically attacked rural areas. This occurred most aggressively during the Obama years.

Not satisfied with increasing death rates in rural areas, Robert Reich, the American media, and their fellow Democrats campaign for more political power to be concentrated in urban centers by abolishing the Electoral College.  The end of the Electoral College would mean even more extreme depredation of rural America than has already occurred. 

Trumponomics = Obamonomics

The Society for Human Resource Management reports the Hay Group's forecast of declining real wage increases for 2018. This is a global phenomenon, not limited to the US. Central banks are expanding credit globally, resulting in escalating stock and real estate markets coupled with stagnant real wages due to what Keynes called "money illusion."

Phil Magness on Facebook has mentioned that Keynes was a leading eugenicist. The coupling of declining real wages for the average worker, especially in rural areas, with increasing subsidization of elite, urban financial and real estate investors is consistent with social Darwinism. 

The strongest proponents of absolute equality, the Democrats, are most closely related with Keynesian economics and social Darwinist redistribution from rural blue collar workers to urban banking interests--although the Republicans are a close second.  

In effect, there is little difference among the econmic policies of the Democrats and the Republicans:  Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II, Obama, and Trump have all overseen expansive stock and real estate markets with stagnant or declining real wages. 

One clue as to how this has proceeded is in the declining number of commercial banks. Expanding credit facilitates takeovers, which means that urban-centered banks consolidate rural banks. In turn, credit is less likely to flow to rural areas because rural investments are too small for the consolidated banks.  Hence, stagnant real wages have accompanied economic declines in rural areas, a point the Wall Street Journal recently emphasized.