I used to attend the National Academy of Science’s Neuroscience symposiums in NYC. I have never seen so many old men acting like children.
They interrupted each other’s presentations, shouting and yelling obscenities at each other. One, who had received a Nobel Prize was the worst.
They owned their knowledge as a possession of their ego and fought with each other as though their life depended upon it.
I had previously read “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” by Thomas S. Kuhn and saw it in action. It accurately describes the process of people defending their status quo theories as though their life depends upon winning the argument.
The only time I had observed worse was at a conference at the University of Leuven in Belgium. The university had split along linguistic lines after a period of civil unrest in 1967–68 commonly known as the “Leuven Affair” in French and “Walloons out”, based on a contemporary slogan, in Dutch. The faculty hostility was so extreme that they split the university, even dividing the university library. The majority of works were just divided by shelfmark: Odds numbered books stayed in Leuven, even numbered books left for Louvain-la-Neuve.
I was there for a conference years after the split and the faculty of both universities attended, continuing their war at our conference. It was far worse than any collegiate sports rivalry between universities. (And I’ve attended many where both Duke and UNC faculty were in attendance!)
This caused me to study what I refer to as “Intellectual Delusion.” This is where very intelligent and educated people hold onto the belief in delusional nonsense. I first encountered this in professional people who I had known for years, and they had the death of a child. Ten years later they would speak of the event as though it happened yesterday.
The ego plays tricks upon our perception of reality in order to protect itself from being diminished, even to the point of not believing what they actually observe.
Motivated reasoning is probably an innate human tendency, probably hard wired into us. “Intellectuals” and scientists are as prone to it as anyone else.
In fact, very smart people may be at especially high risk. Their powers of rationalization are greater. And they have more ego invested in their own opinions.
Socrates made a great point of emphasizing the importance of knowing what one doesn’t know.
“The ego plays tricks upon our perception of reality in order to protect itself from being diminished, even to the point of not believing what they actually observe.”
Well said! And these are people with really big egos!
In this case, “they” are clearly arming the EPA-Green Energy Communist movements to re-engage control as soon as Trump leaves office through lawfare and collaborative court settlements between the state and national EPA regulators and their courts. That IS the reason these books are being written NOW - before the Supreme Court gets its case next year!
Note to Self: Get that book on bias and self-justification in “science”. “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” by Thomas S. Kuhn
As recently as the mid-60’s, tectonic plate movement, mid-ocean rift zones, meteor impact craters, the KT impact death of dinosaurs, DNA and RNA molecular chemistry, the Ice Age flooding and erosion of vast valleys and hills were viciously being fought by “the experts” in “Science” against new theories we see now as “basic facts about how the earth works”.