Ideology and analysis

Some observations on left wing and right wing

Published on August 4, 2004 By Draginol In Politics

When you're dealing with the lower end of the intellectual spectrum, Democrats and Republicans tend to become pretty similar. Their reasons for voting are often equally uninformed or irrational.

At the higher end though, there is a distinct difference based on what I've seen. Democrats tend to rely much more on third party analysis for their political opinions. It's pretty rare to see the "stats freaks" arguing for liberal or Democratic positions. Instead, the Democrats tend to be much more inclined to quote a source they "trust". One might call this lazy political intellectualism or another might put it as efficient use of analysis. But no matter how ou slice it, these Democrats are only as good as their trusted analysis sources.

On the other side, Republicans, and particularly conservatives, tend to be much more inclined to NOT trust those who do analysis (again, at the higher end of the intelligence spectrum here, "ditto heads" on the right are no different that the Moore-ons on the left in their political IQ).

The stats freaks, the ones who actually skip the analysis and go look up the actual statistics or the actual original report are almost always Republicans or at least conservatives. This isn't necessarily a better way. It can be time inefficient and lead to wacko conspiracy theoris when a right winger starts drawing strange conclusions form the data.

Comments

Don Bemont

on Aug 04, 2004

When you're dealing with the lower end of the intellectual spectrum, Democrats and Republicans tend to become pretty similar. Their reasons for voting are often equally uninformed or irrational.

Equally based on TV, image advertising, and entertainment values

Although this is just a leadup to your main point, I think it's important. Since you accused me of coming here only to read agreement with my side (the day after Kerry's acceptance speech), I realized that, in a way, you were exactly wrong -- although your underlying point was correct. In truth, I was coming here for badly stated conservative argument against Kerry.

I realize that I (and I'll bet lots of others, too) come read the threads that sound like they will disagree with me, and I notice the threads written less intelligently. In a thread with two good points by conservatives, but two really idiotic things written by conservatives, I will react to the latter ones. Dumb or bashing comentary by those on "my side" I skim or ignore.

Two results: I (probably we) end up perceiving a lot higher percentage of idiotic opposition (empty bashing, incorrect facts, etc.) than really exists. I (probably we) also allow the debates to be controlled by this group that gets their information from entertainment sources, because it is those posts we like to answer.

The stats freaks, the ones who actually skip the analysis and go look up the actual statistics or the actual original report are almost always Republicans or at least conservatives.

A very interesting point. Most of my conservative friends put a lot more stock in statistics and numbers than I do.

My background is in a field where every public number, every published set of data is hopelessly unreliable. The numbers are collected by people with an agenda, and then are published by people with another agenda. Further, the fact that the data is being collected causes changes in the behaviors being measured. As a hard core baseball fan from a scientific family, I had to learn the hard way the limits of what data can do for you.

Now, to take it one last step, it often seems that people in the social sciences and the humanites tend to have my experience, and, yes, to paint with a broad brush, they are more liberal. People in the hard sciences often have the opposite experience, and yes, they tend to be more conservative.

So I think you are onto something, although I am not sure what causes what.

Madine

on Aug 04, 2004

I have had this happen alot:

1. Someone makes an argument

2. I post statistics that counter that argument

3. The other person starts downplaying the validity of the statistics.

Recently on another board, there was a discussion about marketing and its effect on people. One person said that despite the fact that Pepsi does better in taste tests, it's sales were behind Coke by an order of magnitude because of Coke's marketing (but provided no statistics to back this up). I looked up Coke and Pepsi's sales, and found that in 2001 they were nearly identical. The other person responded that the reason Pepsi had caught up to Coke was because of marketing.

Don Bemont

on Aug 04, 2004

Well, it is easy to mock people's distrust of statistics by showing foolishness of one particular person. But the underlying critique has merit -- although I would never be in favor of moving to the oppositie extreme of discounting all statistics either. It just appears that data is currently being overtrusted as a source of truth.

I can make the case best in my own field, education. The central problem is that what we want education to provide for the next generation is neither defined nor measurable.

We could debate endlessly over the goals of education ( although hope not to in this thread

) but very few of the real goals are countable. The things we can count and record are indirect indications. The simplest example of this is that, although you can count how many words out 100 a person can spell correctly, you cannot count how well that person can write, and every attempt to do so is only an attempt to cover the subjectivity of the matter with an objective veneer.

Grades themselves are rarely an objective measure of knowledge in that they mix content knowledge and understanding in with disparate factos such as health, attendance, cooperation, personality, home life, peers... leaving aside that teachers and schools grade very differently from each other. Standardized tests might appear better, but even here it is an indirect measure, because our goal in education is not the test grade, it is something later in life. People just believe, more or less, that the test grades hopefully correlate with that something later in life. If my thirty years in education have shown me anything, it is that quite a few students with low test scores and classroom grades got a great deal out of their educations, and that the reverse is also frequently true. (Those who mock President Bush's Yale grades don't like this fact.)

Graduation rates are even more slippery, because they are based on tests and grades, but add a whole new level of muddiness. Wanting that sheet of paper often makes the difference between those that do and those that don't graduate -- which may say a lot about an individual, but it is not part of an objective measure of their education.

But this is only the beginning. All these statistics are skewed by adults: the teacher who blatantly teaches to the test rather than to the curriculum.... the guidance counselor who counsels a likely dropout to transfer to another school so that the dropout "black mark" goes on another school's record... the administrator who puts pressure on teachers to grade state exams more easily, and to pass students... standardized test takers who respond to various kinds of political pressure in determining difficulty and content of exams... state education departments who decide which data to to collect and release.

When the gullible look at the resulting educational data, they see unassailable facts, because it is human nature to want a way to get a handle on things without deep immersion in the matter. What they don't realize is that there is a long trail of judgment calls, human error, human agendas, and even dishonesty... and that, in addition, by collecting the data, you are changing the reality in unexpected ways.

In past times, they counted graduation rates. Now, they count how many students graduate in the prescribed number of years. Thus, for a school to be able to publish respectable numbers, they must find ways to push students out the door in that number of years. A plodding but hard working student who could have received a good education in four and a half or five years, is pushed to take easier courses so as to be out the door in four. The data will indicate that the school who does so has "improved" -- but the fact that data shows it to be so, does not make it fact nonetheless.

My point here has nothing to do with educational policy, only that data and statistics are seductive for many. It is certainly the trend among the intelligensia in our era. However, this method of knowing things has serious shortcomings. The fact that someone with unintelligent arguments happens to see it this way does not make it any less true.

CS Guy

on Aug 04, 2004

1. Someone makes an argument

2. I post statistics that counter that argument

3. The other person starts downplaying the validity of the statistics.

Do you have any research that shows this trend?

Madine

on Aug 04, 2004

If my thirty years in education have shown me anything, it is that quite a few students with low test scores and classroom grades got a great deal out of their educations, and that the reverse is also frequently true.

How do you define/measure whether someone "got a great deal out of their education"?

The central problem is that what we want education to provide for the next generation is neither defined nor measurable.

I agree this is a problem. It seems like our goal in education has become to "make students be better people" which is nebulous and impossible to measure.

I think it is important to be careful not to read too much into statistics. The graduation rate is a good example. It is not helpful to have a higher graduation rate if it is fueled by easier courses.

citahellion

on Aug 04, 2004

My very first blog entry was about this phenomenon... it's entitled How people listen. Your behaviour falls under point #2:
2) I disagree with the speaker
Then I will dismiss him as a crank of some sort. If I am feeling generous, I may listen just long enough to hear something that I can find fault with.

Draginol

on Aug 04, 2004

The statistics issue does trap many conservatives. That's because statistics are usually a derivative of other sets of statistics.

I tend to make use of statistics that don't provide a conclusion in themselves, they're just statistics.

For example, there is a big difference between stating that those making under $15,000 per year voted for Gore by a margin of 2 to 1 than to say that poor people vote for Democrats because they want the entitlements Democrats provide.

The former is just a fact, the latter is an analysis.

The reason why people like Michael Moore piss off conservatives is that he makes heavy use of statistics that he will sometimes make up or describe in a way that is incredibly misleading. Democrats, because they don't tend to look at the underlying facts but instead prefer analysis from trusted sources, are more likely to just repeat Moore's conclusions.

When I do analysis, in a serious way anyway, I try to provide the underlying statistics I drew upon. So when I say that the economy had been soft when Bush came into office, I'll provide a link to the GDP chart which isn't subject to very much interpretation. Many terms, such as recessions, have specific definitions.

Factory

on Aug 04, 2004

"1. Someone makes an argument
2. I post statistics that counter that argument
3. The other person starts downplaying the validity of the statistics."
Hmm statistics are tricky things, if I had a zenni for every time a statistic was misused..
The most common misuse I see is more along the lines of:
More people are eating more ice-cream, store deliveries are up 200%.
The statistic quoted does not prove the assertion, it merely shows that there is more ice-cream in stores, a link between ice-cream being in stores and ppl eating it has not been shown. An even weaker statistic would be 'Ice-cream companies profits are up 200%'.

CrispE

on Aug 05, 2004

Draginol:
One of the key statements of statistics and application is: "Figures lie and liars figure." I think liberals and conservatives both want some reassurance of their point of view because their frame of reference says there must be some basis to show they are correct in their worldview. So...for example, a conservative would say "Gays are only 3% of the population." Liberals would then counter that if that were true that would mean 8 million people were being disenfranchised by a Constitutional Amendment. Both statements would be true, statistically correct and "prove" to the respective voices both points correct from their own perspective.

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