Shane Mage wrote: > Textboooks, physics included, are no different from the economics textbooks > we know and love. They only present orthodox established views--radical > alternatives being rarely even mentioned and then only to dismiss them. Not > that this is so wrong when the science is real. Electrical engineering > textbooks are likely to have a great deal about plasma and very little if > anything about the puny force called gravity.
I wonder: cui bono? (who benefits?) in economics, the political weight of the business establishment and the government bias research and thinking in the direction of pro-capitalist economics. In addition, it is hard to break through the "illusions created by competition" and "commodity fetishism," which pushes economists to look at the economy from the inside (from the perspectives of individual businesscritters and consumers) and to ignore the totality of social relations. These forces do not seem to be relevant to physics at all. What physics _may_ share with economics is the internal problem of the domination of long-established tenured professors who not only run the "good" and "respected" journals (along with the main professional organizations) but also hand out tenure and promotion only to those who agree with the orthodoxy (or disagree only on the margin). My experience with the physics profession does not indicate that this is a problem. But I'd like to hear about it from someone from within the profession. (As I've said, I am not a professional physicist by any means, so that I cannot say with conviction that one school of physics is correct and another incorrect.) -- Jim Devine / "Nobody told me there'd be days like these / Strange days indeed -- most peculiar, mama." -- JL. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
