This part prefers the latter student, because her rejection of my teaching requires a willingness to challenge authority (me) and the courage to expose herself to ridicule by taking an unpopular view. Surely it is such people who are also more likely to question authority elsewhere as well, to take the side of the underdog and the powerless against a privileged and powerful establishment?When you get to know such people, Professor, you'll realize that she has simply made a more complete and far more irrational surrender to some authority figure earlier.
I mean, if all science were a conspiracy to hide the truth, there would be some unconcealable cracks in the facade. It wouldn't work as a basis for engineering, for one thing. The computer I'm typing on wouldn't work. (OK, it'll probably burn up like its predecessor some day, but it's worked for almost four years now.)
Then, some people would talk. It's hard to have a conspiracy of five people keeping secrets, much less five hundred thousand around the world.
Thus, the "surrender to authority" most students have to make in science classes as a way to get started isn't that unreasonable. Occam's Razor says that, while the current state of science isn't the last word, it was honestly arrived at.
Which he clearly states.
I find myself having mixed reactions on these threads. I certainly believe the opposition has no intellectual merit in the field of science, but I personally rebel at authority. I was not a good student. I simply can't conform in a classroom. I want to be devil's advocate.