From: schieber@jetson.uh.edu (Schieber, Jay D.)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Hiring quotas and faculty positions (Repost #2)
Date: 13 Sep 92 20:06:00 GMT
Organization: University of Houston
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Sep12.230504.2997@tc.cornell.edu>, bai@msiadmin.cit.cornell.edu (Dov Bai-MSI Visitor) writes...
>In article <12SEP199216440752@jetson.uh.edu> schieber@jetson.uh.edu (Schieber, Jay D.) writes:
>>
>>Faculty are privileged members of privileged groups of (hopefully)
>>very intelligent people that should be thinking constantly about
>>how they can benefit society.  
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>University is a professional establishment where taxpayers are coming to
>be taught and scholars are coming teach them and do research. The rest of
>it is out of the limits of a professional organization and within the
>realm of politics. There are ways to influence political decisions,
>like running and being elected for office by taxpayers. 

This is a very "noble" vision of academia.  But let me ask you some
questions.  Which degrees should be offered?  What courses should
be offered to fulfill that degree?  What content should there be
in each of those courses?  What material should every person 
receiving degree x be required to know?  What grades should be
passing?  What nmber of people is a reasonable amount to graduate
every year?  Who should decide these questions?  Just before lecture,
some of my, say black female students who are in the majority,
are "legally expressing their opinions" to the minority white
male students that white males are inherently inferior, and 
shouldn't be allowed in the class at all. This makes it very
difficult for the students to study in lecture while being
stared at?  Should I try to do something to stop it?  Would
that be political?  Some of the students draw swastikas (Hakenkreuzen)
on the blackboard before and after lecture?  Should I ask them
to stop?  Is that political? Some  of these
questions have political components, some have technical components,
some have teaching components, and some have all three.
So who decides: the politicians, the 
scientists, or both?  When I speak in class, should I speak in
a way that is more easily understood by the natives, or more
easily understood by the mix of students?  Won't there be political
consequences no matter how I decide?

You see, the realm of politics is not constrained to some small
box that we can "stay out of", even if we wanted to.  Our 
personal acts have political ramifications, no matter how we
act.  This is not some new part of life, it has always been the
case.  Before, the political views of academicians were often so similar
with regards to these questions, they did not even realize that
they were making political decisions.  Now that other faculty
have differing viewpoints, their sensibilities are offended.
If I have a candidate that does genetic studies that searches
for inherent inferiorities in Norwegians/blacks/jehovah's witnesses/
arabs/whatever, is that just a technical question?


> 
>The problem is that some people within the professional organization
>are using the power they are having to influence hiring decisions,
>for causes which they may perceive as "noble". But their "noble"
>causes are (1) not related to the professional goals of universities 
>and (2) are not universally pereceived as "noble". Affirmative
>action is a good example. It has been debated for many years, and 
>certainly not all tax and tuition payers would agree to it.

No, they would not.  In some parts of this country, some states'
residents would strongly object to admitting any blacks into
the white universities at all.  It took a political movement
to change it.  SHould professors have been involved?  Should
physicists in fascist Germany support the war effort by doing
research that could be used to develop nuclear weapons?  Isn't
that a valid political question?



> 
>This places the professionals in a university in a situation that even
>politicians cannt dream about: to influence hiring decisions without
>any danger to their jobs and without the need to report to the public 
>once in 4 years or so what they are doing, and get the public approval
>to it. And there are also many intelligent people outside the 
>universities and also not so intelligent people inside the universities.
>Why should university professionals be given such power ?

Like Clarence Thomas :-) ?


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>Dov
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>Suggestions otherwise are now 
>>being used by ideologically-opposed powerful groups to hide the
>>fact that they had their own social agenda for decades.  At least
>>some people are now being honest about the debate.
>>
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>>
>>> 
>>>>Leonard Evens      len@math.nwu.edu      708-491-5537
>>>>Dept. of Mathematics, Northwestern Univ., Evanston, IL 60208
>>> 
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