Jonathan Haidt on good intentions and bad ideas - Sydney Business Insights

The problem arises when people who are against diversity of thought occupy positions of power in academia. Having people with different ideas is what drives the quest for knowledge. If only people from one side of the political spectrum dominate the universities (in the current case its people from the left) all it will do is increase polarization and cause people from the other side of the political spectrum to lose faith in that institution. This is what we have in this country currently with people from the right losing faith in the universities because they are dominated by people on the left. He does mention that it isn’t as bad yet in the engineering departments on campuses. Probably because we engineers tend to be a bit more mission focused than the average members of the population. Most of the engineers I know, myself included, tend to be centerist/ slightly right leaning, more like libertarians in many things.

Social media is incredibly damaging formour children. The data on that is quite conclusive. There is a reason my children are not allowed to participate in it. Social media can contribute to the polarization of adults too but at least our mature brains are a bit better at distinguishing reality from what is online. (Although occasionally I still find myself getting extremely upset about posts I read) the problem with online interaction vs real interactions is the ease at which all civility is lost...