Not that I can tell. A fairly far-right math prof, but not alt and not surprising given his background. Other than their dedication to obvious heresies such as global climate change and arithmetic, they’re pretty quiet about their politics.
Alt-right would be rather uncomfortable here given the population.
Could be – I haven’t had much contact with them. Biology is small but growing (just got a notice for a new class in evolutionary biomechanics.) Lots of geologists, though.
A quote from C.S. Lewis’ Screwtape is useful in understanding the politics of mathematicians:
By the very act of arguing, you awake the patient’s reason; and once it is awake, who can foresee the result?
I went to university for math and many of my friends went on to be professors. Basically they are smart enough to find a good justification whatever idea they come up with. I’d wager heavily that somewhere out there there is an alt-right math professor, and that, seemingly paradoxically, that professor disagrees with half of what the alt-right espouses and thinks that almost everyone else in the alt-right is a complete moron.
This is a lovely phrase.
You’d be surprised horrified to learn how many trained geologists in the extraction business (oil, gas, coal) believe the Earth is literally 6,000-8,000 years old. I often wonder how much better they could do their jobs if they weren’t using the equivalent of pre-Copernicus cosmology:
Before looking at that just now I don’t think I’d ever really stopped to consider how they arrived at the order of the celestial bodies. Venus is closer to us than the Sun which is closer to us than Mars.
Obviously this shouldn’t occupy too much of my brain since whatever method they used was straight up wrong, but it is fascinating me nonetheless.
Relevant bit:
[quote]But after re-acquainting myself with this stuff, I think I see a couple of things happening that would make set theory problematic for some Christian fundamentalists.
First: Some of these folks get very touchy about the idea of infinity. Mark Chu-Carroll is a software engineer at foursquare and a math blogger. Unlike me, he was already aware of the fundamentalist objection to set theory, because he’s actually had people show up in his comment section railing about how the theory is an affront to God. Particularly the part about multiple infinities. Chu-Carroll told me that one commenter explained the problem this way: “There is only one infinity, and that is God.” Basically, this perspective looks at set theory and Georg Cantor and sees humankind trying to replace the divine with numbers and philosophy.
The second problem is a little more complex. Remember how the modern idea of set theory really isn’t all that modern? That’s because I’m pretty sure A Beka doesn’t mean “modern” as in “recent”, but “modern” as in “modernist”.
I can tell you from experience that A Beka (and Bob Jones University Press) are stridently against modernism in all its forms. (I’m assuming they’re against post-modernism, too, but you have to understand that the opinions and perspectives this sort of Christian fundamentalism has about society and culture were formed between the late 1920s and early 1970s and, because of this, the culture wars that they are fighting often come across as confusingly antiquated. Thus, the ongoing obsession with the imminent threat of Communism. See also: Why I sat through multiple sermons on the evils of rock n’ roll in the late 1990s.)
If you associate modernism primarily with abstract art, Scandinavian furniture, and houses made out of glass, then all of this is probably just as confusing as set theory, itself. But art isn’t really what the fundamentalists are thinking about when they think about modernism.
Instead, they see modernism as the opposing worldview to their own. They are all about tradition (or, at least, what they have decided is traditional). Modernism is a knee-jerk rejection of tradition in favor of the new. Obviously, they think a very specific sort of Christian God should be the center of everything and all parts of society, public and private. Modernists prefer ideas like secular humanism and think God is something you should be doing in private, on your own time. They believe strongly in the importance of power hierarchies and rules. Modernism smashes all of that and says, “Hey, just do your own thing. Nobody’s ideas are any better or worse than anybody else’s. There’s no right and wrong. Go crazy, man!” [Insert obligatory bongo drumming session]
I am hamming this up a bit, but you get the picture. Modernism, to the publishers of A Beka math books, is sick and wrong. The idea is that if you reject their specific idea of God and their specific idea of The Rules, then you must be living in a crazy, dangerous world. You could kill people, and you would think it was okay, because you’re a modernist and you know there’s really no such thing as right and wrong. Basically, they’ve bumped into a need to separate themselves from the almost inhuman Other on a massive scale, and latched on to modernism as a shorthand for how to do that. It doesn’t matter what you or I actually believe, or even what we actually do. They know what we MUST believe and what we MUST be like because of the tenets of modernism.
More importantly, they know that we are subtle, and use sneaky means to indoctrinate children and lure adults into accepting modernist values. So the art, the literature, the jazz—probably the Scandinavian furniture, too, though I never heard anyone mention that specifically—are all just traps. They’re ways of getting us to reject to One True Path a little bit at a time. (I should note that, up to this point, I am basing my analysis on what I was taught in Baptist school. After this, I’m speculating, and attempting to connect the ideas I know are present in this subculture with set theory.)
Set theory, particularly the stuff about infinity, has a bit of that wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey flavor to it. It doesn’t make sense on the level of “common sense”. It’s dealing with things that aren’t standard, simple numbers. It makes links between nice, factual math and floppy, subjective philosophy. If you’re raised in Christian fundamentalist culture, all of that—every last bit—absolutely reeks of modernism. It’s easy to see how somebody at A Beka would look at set theory and conclude that it’s really just modernist propaganda. To them, set theory is just a step on the road to godless atheism.
Add in the historical fact that Georg Cantor’s ideas weren’t terribly popular at first, and they can easily create a narrative where true math is being suppressed so that false, modernist math can corrupt the minds of children.
If this sounds crazy … you’re right. It’s pretty crazy. In fact, it’s this kind of thinking, and my realization that it was based fundamentally on lying about everybody who wasn’t a member of your religious tribe, that led me away from religion to begin with. Ironically. But there is a coherent thought process going on here, and I want you to understand that. If all you do is point and laugh at the fundies for calling set theory evil, then you are missing the point. This isn’t about them being stupid. It’s about who they think you are.[/quote]
Coincidence?
It’s not as bad as all that. There would be no way to know distances yet, so the method is presumably based on apparent speed. But the planets are all in the correct order, save only that the Earth (with its moon) has been interchanged with the Sun, on the expectation their relative motion comes from the latter.
Terrific! Some person has a very shallow mental model of mathematics, and that makes me a godless heathen? Fine, I guess?
I get that it’s a lot more complicated than that. I’m just being flip because I don’t have a lot of respect for anti-intellectualism. I guess the feeling is mutual.
I meant the students who are making these complaints. What programs do alt-righties tend to enroll in?
Are there any professors from Liberty University on the list?
History 203: Nazi Germany
Political Science 211: Analysis Of Despotism
Economics 234: Advanced Libertarianism
English 178: Machiavelli and Other Tyrants
Well, it’s the fact that it is right except for the transposition of Earth and Sun that is so interesting to me. Obviously what they did was fundamentally wrong, but it’s right in an interesting way.
Also, I know that I am generally anti-idiom, but I just need to say that I hate people referring to others as “snowflakes”. It sounds extremely foolish to me. Whomever you are thinking of, chances are that they are not a snowflake, nor a knight, wolf, or any of these other labels. Try to test your descriptive faculties beyond hoping to get daft names to stick.
But how about throwing it back at people who use it to belittle the suffering of others, in order to demonstrate their insidious hypocrisy? I for one appreciate Cory’s use of it his post’s context.
The cause is more important, but I can still feel squicked. We all have our limits, and I am sure that some of mine are ridiculous. Hopefully I make up for them to some extent in other areas.
Not really all that surprising. Compartmentalization is a big thing in some circles.
As long as they’re thinking about the strata directly underfoot, it really doesn’t matter how it got there. They just check where the water is, which layers are lying at whatever angle and so thick, stuff like that and it’s all good.
Hereabouts, engineering seems to be the thing. However, the student population (and much of the faculty) being as light on Anglos as it is I don’t think they are going to be terribly comfortable here and especially trying to come out of the sewers.
Should have seen that coming:
