re: Why Scientists and extremely smart people are usually socialist/leftist

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It's because they're pretentious asses who think they know what is best for the people, even more so than the people themselves.

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As a holder of a professional degree(and therefore experience with the "type"), this is pretty much it. Many truly believe they are smart enough to figure out what's best for everyone. They believe that if they read about being a mechanic, they could pass a regulation to make repair shops run better. They don't require experience, just their perfect brains. And for some, the whole time they don't realize how little they think/respect the people they wish to regulate.

And God forbid someone thinks differently, you must be crazy.

However, in the end they are still by and large generally good people who contribute economically to society, so that's alright by me.

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It's because they're pretentious asses who think they know what is best for the people, even more so than the people themselves.

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This is the correct answer.

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It's because they're pretentious asses who think they know what is best for the people, even more so than the people themselves.

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There is also the fact that until relatively recently those who pursued careers in academia were poorly paid compared to those who went to work in private industry. They were upset that people they considered inferior to themselves were making more money, and they supported policies to reverse those circumstances. Some of it was plain old jealousy. Now that tenured faculty are making much better money I expect to see some changes to the politics of the academic community in the coming years.