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"We try to hire the best, smartest people available," Brandon, of Duke Univesity, said of his philosophy hires. "If, as John Stuart Mill said, stupid people are generally conservative, then there are lots of conservatives we will never hire.
"Mill's analysis may go some way towards explaining the power of the Republican party in our society and the relative scarcity of Republicans in academia. Players in the NBA tend to be taller than average. There is a good reason for this. Members of academia tend to be a bit smarter than average. There is a good reason for this too."
Let me make a couple of points.
1) To say all stupid people are conservative does not logically conclude that all conservative people are stupid.
2) Just because John Stuart Mill said it, doesn’t ensure that it is true. Well that MAY have been the case in Mill’s time, today the situation is reversed. Stupid people are generally liberal. I cite Algore’s recent mental breakdown.
3) Do these people who quote Mill agree with EVERYTHING he wrote?
Here’s something else Mill concluded:
John Stuart Mill had always favoured the secret ballot but Harriet Taylor disagreed and eventually changed her husband's views on the subject. Taylor feared that people would vote in their own self-interest rather than for the good of the community. She believed that if people voted in public, the exposure of their selfishness would shame them in voting for the candidate who put forward policies that were in the interests of the majority.
I wonder if the good Professor Brandon would agree to that too?
Posted by Ted at February 10, 2004 9:34 PM