"I weep for those who take up higher level social studies or other fuzzy subjects in college. The sheer arbitrariness (is that a word?) of it all is stunning. I've never really had to deal with it first hand, but know people who have. Imagine doing math if the value of pi was subject to a vote of your superiors."

The example I was referring to, with the promising grad student, was a mathematician. Don't kid yourself about so-called "fuzzy" subjects. There are a few, but for the most part claims in academia are madeningly parsimonious and backed up to the hilt.

"Even if you make the somewhat odd assumption that academia has nothing to do with the political end of Left and Right, it still has a lot to do with the philosophical base of these political views. It is no coincidence that if there is a single Republican in many sociological departments, it's probably the janitor, and if you are going to get anywhere in academia you had damn well better peel that Bush sticker off your car and keep your opinions to yourself."

Again, you would be surprised. It varies by department. I have known philosophy departments with a very conservative leaning- but I willl grant that there are a lot of liberals in the faculty of many universities- but again and loudly: If unreasoned and unsupported and unprovable bias leaked into their work, they would be eaten alive. In some fields I have observed that Faculty don't make friends with other Faculty.

Davin L.