Only Six Percent Of Scientists Are Republicans: Pew Poll

[Bozita]

Source: HuffPo

Only Six Percent Of Scientists Are Republicans: Pew Poll
by Sahil Kapur


A new study by the Pew Research Center finds that the GOP is alienating scientists to a startling degree.

Only six percent of America's scientists identify themselves as Republicans; fifty-five percent call themselves Democrats. By comparison, 23 percent of the overall public considers itself Republican, while 35 percent say they're Democrats.

The ideological discrepancies were similar. Nine percent of scientists said they were "conservative" while 52 percent described themselves as "liberal," and 14 percent "very liberal." The corresponding figures for the general public were 37, 20 and 5 percent.

Among the general public, moderates and independents ranked higher than any party or ideology. But among scientists, there were considerably more Democrats (55%) than independents (32%) and Republicans (6%) put together. There were also more liberals (52%) than moderates (35%) and conservatives (9%) combined.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/10/only-six-percent-of-scien_n_229382.html

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6% sounds kinda high to me.

[billyoc]

1. What does any scientific field hold for a greedy misanthrope?

Six percent sound high indeed.

[Johonny]

38. the few Republican scientists I know of are all fundies

they acknowledge only facts within their own field.

[No Elephants]

52. In that case, they are not scientists, only trying to pass for scientists.

[XemaSab]

96. I know one biologist who doesn't believe in evolution

I would guess that the rest of the republicans were chemists or physicists. :shrug:

[MetaTrope]

86. Those 6 percent are the statisticians

If election experiences of this millennia are anything to go by.

[pbrower2a]

98. Science isn't for greedy narcissists.

Science pays badly for the intellectual rigors. Engineering, finance, accountancy, medicine, law, dentistry, veterinary medicine, and architecture pay more -- often far more. The humanities pay less only because they have lesser rigor. The pay is good until one realizes that one practically needs a PhD for the plum spots. Fame? For every flamboyant Neil deGrasse Tyson (or such late figures as Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, or Richard Feynmann), thousands toil in obscurity to the layman. Such fame as most scientists have comes from fellow scientists (unless it comes with the encouragement of the government, as with nuclear programs that it sponsors, likely to compete with other science). Rough as Hollywood is as a place in which to make a living, it offers far easier fame. (Of course, wise people assess whether they want the bummers as well as boons of fame -- like getting inconvenient attention). Journalism, sports, popular music, and virtuoso performance in classical music offer more potential for fame.


Scientists might have some economic security... but it comes with a price of drudgery. Scientists are typically doing double-blind tests to verify the incremental discoveries of other scientists, not knowing what they are trying to find. Such work is deathly-dull.

The great reward? Most scientists do science because they wouldn't do anything else. They can see the Big Picture even if they are complete fools on the test of the day. They need not concern themselves with profit and loss. Science is a calling.

Now why should scientists want anything to do with a Party that has a religious-fundamentalist wing that insists that the pseudo-scientific bilge that is creationism is genuine science and does real good for its believers? That turns political debate into propaganda with fallacies that anyone with appreciable learning could detect and refute? That panders to anti-intellectualism? That fosters pseudo-history (America was founded to be a veritable theocracy)? That chooses to make education so fiendishly expensive that it forces people to look first at money-grubbing as the only way to pay it back? That denies global warming?

Applied scientists -- most notably geologists -- might think somewhat differently because their most likely employers are in Big Oil.

[truthisfreedom]

2. They should measure IQ in the general public next.

IQ versus party affiliation would be verrry revealing.

[SharonAnn]

16. Except that in my Mensa cohort, there are a disappointing number of Republicans. 1 is too many.

[clixtox]

26. The Mensa IQ test must be biased... N/T

[wallwriter]

78. If you think that logic puzzles and 9th grade math...

...can measure true intelligence, how smart can you really be?

[Odin2005]

35. That's because Mensa attracts people that are self-centered assholes.

I am eligible for membership to Mensa, but I refuse out of principle because I'm not a narcissist that brags about my IQ score. A person's intelligence by itself is useless, it's how you use it that matters.

[eirteacher]

45. I qualified for MENSA

I qualified for MENSA but was smart enough not to pay the dues.Does that mean I am smarter than the MENSA members? 6% does sound high.

[crikkett]

67. I'm secure enough in my intellect

to even need the validation of qualifying for MENSA.

[No Elephants]

53. I love irony.

"I am eligible for membership to Mensa, but I refuse out of principle because I'm not a narcissist that brags about my IQ score."

[Robb]

58. Brags

...more than once. ;)

[Odin2005]

69. I wasn't bragging about anything.

[Tunkamerica]

81. you just don't understand

it takes a truly great mind to see that not as bragging, but for what it really is: a statement of moral and mental superiority with a false sense of subtlety.

[Zhade]

88. LOL!

Indeed.

[kestrel91316]

36. We have a similar problem among veterinarians. I hear that we are

predominantly Republicans.

Beats hell out of me why that is.......

[uncle ray]

72. they like to date their patients.

[Johonny]

39. real scientist know "IQ" tests don't measure IQ

so don't care what their IQ is. They however get great joy at self centered IQ buffs

[No Elephants]

54. Results of IQ tests and actual intelligence are not necessarily the same.

[napoleon_in_rags]

62. I know a guy with a doctorate who works in the IQ testing field, and agrees:

Basically things alone the lines of the Theory of Multiple Intelligences have much more credence:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences
The accepted idea is that IQ tests are really good for diagnosing mental disabilities and low functioning people and really bad at dealing with smart people, because as you go up in IQ it branches like a tree into different manifestations. Some might say every manifestation of genius is singular and unique.

[Odin2005]

71. Actually, IQ tests suck at the low intelligence end, to.

I've read many stories of so-called "low functioning" autistics that were considered mentally retarded that were found out to be of perfectly normal intelligence when given a keyboard and so are able to communicate.

[Odin2005]

70. Given the history of intelligence testing I'll bet most IQ buffs are racist, sexist reactionaries.

[daninthemoon]

3. AND... only 6 percent of republicans are scientists.

[Bicoastal]

4. And I'm surprised it's that much.

[nradisic]

5. Ouch!

Greedy Obtuse and Petulant is the GOP all right...

[Cha]

6. And, the rest are rancid

breath hypocritics who worship at the altar of greed, oligarchy, and perversion.

[and-justice-for-all]

7. A conservative Scientist...hmm...

isn't that working against your own interest?

[Ian David]

8. That's why The Vistors will round them all up in their spaceships. n/t

[NRaleighLiberal]

9. The Flat Earth society doesn't require a degree!

Science is...well, way too scientific for the black and white, authoritarian, "man walked with dinosaurs and the earth is only 6000 years old" party!

[Kerrytravelers]

10. I'd also bet that the Conservatives in science are fiscal conservatives and not the fundie types.

[No Elephants]

55. I think the fundie types may well go into science to attempt to support things like

Creationism. After all, someone has to testify in the court cases.

[Posteritatis]

76. That too, yeah

Though I know a couple of really socially-conservative mathemeticians (though, to be fair, they're also evangelical atheists as opposed to fundies).

[MaineYooper]

11. Sounds high to me

Speaking as a professional scientist, and based on my own informal polling, I'm surprised it would even come in as high as 6%.

[Kutjara]

12. Well, the righties need "scientists"...

to give "credibility" to all the bullshit they believe about life, climate, drugs, race, gender, sexuality...you name it. That precious 6% tell them everything they need to hear. The other 94% are just following the leftist agenda.

[sam sarrha]

13. but they don't believe in Facts.. not approved by the party platform

because there are no facts involved in their ideology, they are a cult, they only do what they are told..

[Wetzelbill]

15. yeah something like that

RW authoritarians believe trusted sources over anything else. Say if Rush Limbaugh, a trusted source, says something, but then that science book in front of them says different, they will typically believe that the trusted source is right.

[Wetzelbill]

14. I wonder if this was a little different in the past

I would think since the rise of RW authoritarianism, authoritarian thinkers would be predisposed to stay out of the sciences.

[pbrower2a]

60. Authoritarianism and Science

In view of the contempt that scientists have toward authoritarian ideologies (Galileo vs. the then-tyrannical Roman Catholic Church, Christian fundamentalists prohibiting the teaching of evolution, Nazis putting a price on the life of Albert Einstein and having Sigmund Freud on an execution list, Stalin sponsoring the quack Lysenko) for what they do, it's hard to imagine scientists having much use for totalitarian causes. Quacks can flourish in totalitarian systems so long as the quacks are "politically useful", as with the many "racial scientists" in the Third Reich...

All in all systems that put ideology or religious doctrines beyond any challenge are bad places for scientists.

[depakid]

17. How often have we said it?

Facts have a liberal bias....

:rofl:

[harry_pothead]

18. I'm pretty sure that's related to creationism and the religious right.

Something like 70% of Republicans don't believe in evolution, compared to 30ish percent of indys and dems.

[alfredo]

19. the 6% were Christian Science practitioners who misunderstood the question.

[TommyO]

20. Proof positive that educated people are Democrats.

[Historic NY]

21. exactly they don't call it a Liberal Arts degree for nothing....

:hi:

[Salviati]

40. Though I'm sure it depends a bit on what type of education one seeks out...

Some friends and I were just discussing the other day how engineers tend to trend a lot more republican than scientists, with the exeption of electical engineers, who are practially physicists (at least in our experiance)

[pitchforksandtorches]

22. As a scientist I am strongly in favour of

the simplest explanations inferred from empirical data. The more I consider the Flying Spaghetti Monster (FSM) theory, the FSM theory has a lot going for it. First, it should satisfy even the most ardent Intelligent Design detractors. Secondly, since everyone needs to eat and to believe in something, the FSM theory fulfils these desires. Finally, FSM neatly ties together the many ideas about the creation of the universe. I plan on exposing my students to the FSM theory over a pasta dinner.
RAmen
http://www.venganza.org/

[Third Doctor]

23. real science

does not match up well with creationism. From what I have seen most hard right wingers barely believe in science and have a limited view of the universe and reality.

[Faygo Kid]

24. FReepers worship that great scientist, Rush, with a whole 3 WEEKS of college behind him.

Tough to be a GOP scientist when you have to take orders from that. And they all take orders from him, let there be no doubt.

Well, maybe they can go for theology, and their role model there, Ann Coulter, who at least has degrees.

Of course, you may as well get your theology from Nosferatu. Oh well . . .

[Gman]

25. Completely makes sense

They're entirely too intelligent and too educated too be Republicans.

[mnhtnbb]

27. In 2004 I tried to appeal to my brother, as a scientist, to turn from Bush

and support Kerry. He wouldn't do it. As one of his sons told me, "He's all about taxes. That's all he cares about."

[Lionel Mandrake]

28. Since the republicans under W declared war on science,

it shouldn't come as a big surprise that scientists have returned the favor.

[troubledamerican]

29. 6 percent is all they need to unleash social chaos

[MidwestTransplant]

30. News Flash. 94% of Scientests believe in Science

[SteelPenguin]

31. We see this as saying Liberals are Smart

They'll see this as saying Scientists have a liberal bias....and continue to ignore anything they say.

[Fearless]

32. Knowledge is power! ...But really, 6% seems kinda low to me

Based on what I've seen anyways. Not too much, but a bit.

[AlbertCat]

33. And only 6% of "not real scientists, but play one on TV" are Republicans too.

[Odin2005]

34. Reality has a Liberal bias!

[lurky]

37. Scientists are swayed by facts and evidence, not

cheap appeals to fear and bigotry. They are also usually trained to spot logical fallacies like the straw man or the ad hominem argument. And their math is good enough to see through the deceptive fiscal and statistical claims conservatives are always making up to confuse the voters.

Take away these tricks, and there ain't a whole lot left to vote for.

[LynnTheDem]

41. But we're still a conservative nation!!1!

Heh.

[Ohio Joe]

42. Yet another story thats falls into the "Well Duh!" category

8 years of the douchbag shitting on science, gee wiz, why would they not be republican :sarcasm:

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

43. cause they haven't "evolved"

much

[farmboxer]

44. Damned Plutocracy!

It's all about the money.

[orleans]

46. "6% sounds kinda high to me." no shit! n/t

[optimal-tomato]

47. Conservatives are right! Science education makes you liberal!

Proof positive that there is a science-community kabal that creates evidence for Global Warming and Evilution. More reason not to send your kids to secular colleges, and to try to get the Bible and prayer back into the high schools! Hell, get rid of the public schools altogether so churches and families can teach their kids more about the Bible.

But seriously, I have a question. I skimmed the Pew report and I can't figure out what's considered a "scientist". Are we talking exclusively physics/chemistry/biology and sub-categories like medical fields? Are professions in the social sciences considered scientists? What about economists, which are sort of just a kind of social science when you think about it.

(Edit)
Just found it, in case anyone wants to know, based on the membership of American Association for the Advancement of Science:

1,255 from Biological and Medical
348 from Chemistry
154 from Geosciences
229 from Physics and Astronomy

[Fumesucker]

48. Lysenkoism, even Republican Lysenkoism, isn't viewed with much respect by most scientists..

Edited for speling.

[Hubert Flottz]

49. 99% of Nazis are republicans...

at heart, the other one percent is undecided, but leaning reich wing.

EDIT...99% of all NUTzys are GOPers...Wing NUTzys

[mwb970]

50. Hard to understand any real scientist being a republican.

Or any woman, or any gay person, or any immigrant, or any member of any of the other groups that republicans routinely demonize. Is it delusion? Self-loathing?

The odious republican party has become the party of older, uneducated, angry evangelical Christian white men living in rural areas of the South. This description cannot apply to many scientists!

[AlbertCat]

65. living in rural areas of the South.

Once again!....I must point out that

New Mexico... Alaska.... North Dakota ... Wyoming.... Oklahoma.... Kansas.... Utah....


These states are not in the South. There are plenty of uneducated republicans in rural NY and Maine too.

Stupid Repugs are not a Southern Phenomenon.

[ProudDad]

91. Actually New Mexico has a Dem Governor

You may have meant my total outlier state - Arizona...

Ah, Arizona. Home of the most right-wing republican bat-shit crazy legislature in the country...I think we just overtook Texas for the crown!

A republican gov. took over after Janet Napolitano abandoned us (traitorous dog!) and even SHE thinks the Leg is bat-shit crazy...

[Kolesar]

51. Wildlife biologists have no reason to vote Republican

GOP policies destroy habit, rip up the countryside for resources, and ultimately will destroy the atmosphere (global warming).

[No Elephants]

56. More and more, I am coming to think that differences in the way the minds of Republicans work and

the way that the minds of Democrats work are hard wired.

This is not a conclusion I am pleased to approach because I am usually on the nurture side of the nature/nurture debate when it comes to using genetics to predict behavior.

[ProudDad]

92. You're right...Check it out

John Dean already documented the fact that republicans are wired differently...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatives_without_Conscience

Very good book. But don't buy it here, buy it at your local bookseller!

http://www.amazon.com/Conservatives-Without-Conscience-John-Dean/dp/0670037745

[slackmaster]

57. That's a strong rebuttal of Republican principles but a lukewarm endorsement of the Democratic Party

At best it's a fallback to the lesser of two evils. 55% is hardly an enthusiastic figure.

[Burma Jones]

59. I have a Neighbor, PhD Physicist from Dartmouth, Nanotech Specialist

He was "let go" from his contractor position at NIST. He is struggling to find another job. About a month ago, we received a letter addressed to him from "The Center for Creation Science" It had a first class stamp on it. We naturally walked over and gave it to his wife, but I have to believe that a Fundie is going to have a hard time keeping a job in the Sciences......

And yes, he's a Republican......

and I doubt he's a big Proselytizer.

[fascisthunter]

61. HEY! We are dealing with Fact Based People Here!!!!

what ya expect?

[eppur_se_muova]

63. If it weren't for petroleum geologists, that figure would be even lower, I'm guessing. nt

[No Elephants]

77. Good point!

[Mrs. Overall]

64. Believing Adam and Eve frolicked with the dinosaurs doesn't bode well for a future scientist.

[Joe Bacon]

83. Reminds me of the dumbest thing my aunt ever said

She is a totally brainwashed Christian. I still remember her telling me that The Flintstones was the only Christian show on TV because it showed that dinosaurs existed with men.

This coming from an idiot who watches Trinity Broadcasting Network all the time and sends 10% of her Social Security check to closet queen Paul Crouch and his shrew wife.

[Zhade]

89. Believing in Adam and Eve doesn't bode well either!

NT!

[onager]

66. David Whorowitz will go ballistic...

n/t

[crikkett]

68. LOL

"Whorowitz"

[Greyskye]

73. Science has a well known Liberal Bias...

[steven johnson]

74. Colbert: Reality has a well known liberal bias

Reality is a bitch -- a liberal bitch.

"Reality has a well known liberal bias."
— Stephen Colbert

Reality has a well known liberal bias

[Juche]

75. How do they define scientist

I'm not sure what they mean. Do they mean people who have degrees in scientific fields and work in them, only PhDs, or what exactly?

Either way, as an undergrad my experience mirrored that. Very few theists and those that were tended to be deists rather than believers in an interactive diety.

[nsd]

95. They surveyed members of the AAAS.

AAAS = American Association for the Advancement of Science (best known for publishing the journal Science).

The membership is overwhelmingly doctoral-level scientists and graduate students

[MisterP]

79. oo, do they have numbers for other fields: I'd love to see how historians of science break down

and a small caveat, that scientists and authoritarianism aren't exactly oil and water: there are plenty of oil-and-water ("mayonnaise") scientists who believe science is some totalizing, unquestionable system that, paradoxically, is the purest form of democracy (though these died off with Fred Hoyle)
(hell, you can make some have a stroke by reminding them of the limp-wristed humanities majors who deny The Bell Curve)
as James E. Strick and Stephen Jay Gould (boo, hiss!) pointed out, craniometry and eugenics can't be dismissed post facto as a brief, "irrational" failure of scientific thinking when the big scientists, science funds, and much scientific consensus were behind them. More pointedly, would it have been wrong and irrational to insist on human equality in 1900? Or if equality had never been "scientifically proven"? Can Cyril Burt be wrong without any studies "disproving" him? Does a dog feel pain at being eviscerated without an EEG?
heck, go to Amazon's Mismeasure of Man site and there's vicious flame wars

[undeterred]

80. I've heard that 9 out of 10 college professors vote Democrat.

No critical thinkers vote Republican, so its not hard to guess which fields the Republicans would be in.

[Ardent15]

82. I'm reminded of the phrase...

"You are entitled to your own opinion. You are not, however, entitled to your own facts."

[ThoughtCriminal]

84. Republican Scientists I've met

are usually in fields that the GOP favors when it comes to funding: weapons research and maybe petroleum engineers. They may hold the fundies in contempt, but are willing to play along for the gravy.

[DCBob]

85. Republicans prefer "gut feelings" to scientific fact.

Thanks for posting. It is quite shocking actually.

[Zhade]

87. I'm surprised it's that high, considering republicans don't like things like "facts" and "evidence".

NT!

[ProudDad]

90. Somehow they lumped in "creation science"

as science?

That might get them to 6% :rofl:

If they include the dismal economists (which is NOT a science, it's a theology)...

[ivanincali]

93. Republicans are too stupid to be scientists.

[Turbineguy]

94. This means repubs

will have to change what it is that makes a scientist a scientist.

Idiot in beater car with Bush/Cheney04 sticker: Scientist.

[Haole Girl]

97. That many?

;-)

[TexasObserver]

99. not surprised at these stats