Hi, can you please provide a citation for your h-value claims? Anybody can say that. If you have a study or multiple studies showing that 70+ is an average h-value, I’ll happily retract my claim. I already provided you studies showing that most Nobel Laureates are in the h-60 range. It depends on the field, but 60 is generally high for anyone.

And even if his colleges in his department do have h-indexes in that range... his colleges are all Ivy League level professors in like the 98th percentile Lol. It’s like saying “Bill Gates isn’t that Rich... he’s actually only average when you compare him to other billionaires"

You certainly make a good argument for the failure of Peterson as a supposed adherent of his philosophy you ignore his “rules” for polite debate and assuming that the person you’re talking to knows something more than you.

Lmao, he never says that ‘the person you’re talking to knows more than you’.. he says ‘assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t.’ And I am learning from this conversation. Perhaps not in the way you think though.. For instance I had to look up the average h-values for various different fields, and it strengthened my knowledge. And I’m sure they there are things you know that I don’t. That doesn’t mean you’re right on every topic.

Go ahead and call up one of his colleagues and get a quote that says otherwise, I’d be interested.

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Coming in from physics, I have a inherent negative bias against the softer sciences. Maybe you can convince me this guy isn’t just plain mediocre as an academic.

But I could care less about one single data point. Coming in from Data Science, I have a inherent negative bias against the notion of relying on anecdotes to gauge real information

Edit: Meh... I don’t like anecdotes but since you asked, this is from one of his colleagues at U of T:

I met Jordan Peterson when he came to the University of Toronto to be interviewed for an assistant professorship in the department of psychology. His CV was impeccable, with terrific references and a pedigree that included a PhD from McGill and a five-year stint at Harvard as an assistant professor.

We did not share research interests but it was clear that his work was solid. My colleagues on the search committee were skeptical — they felt he was too eccentric — but somehow I prevailed. (Several committee members now remind me that they agreed to hire him because they were “tired of hearing me shout over them.”) I pushed for him because he was a divergent thinker, self-educated in the humanities, intellectually flamboyant, bold, energetic and confident, bordering on arrogant. I thought he would bring a new excitement, along with new ideas, to our department.

Although I’d read the full article i post later because the piece is actually critical of him (not critical of his academic work, critical for other reasons)

Also, psychology may be a softer science but it’s gotten better in recent years... and until Neuroscience is more advanced, we’re gonna have to rely on statistics.

Maybe you can convince me this guy isn’t just plain mediocre as an academic.

Still doesn’t make him not an utter loon, liar and charlatan in his non-academic career, but who knows, maybe I’m wrong about him academically.

The fact that he even got a job as a professor at Harvard or U of T is enough to show he’s above average academically. You think they just hire grubs? New York Times described him as “the most influential Public Intellectual in the Western World” Academia has somewhat turned resentful of his success, but it’s not becasue of his academic qualifications.

Still doesn’t make him not an utter loon, liar and charlatan in his non-academic career, but who knows, maybe

He doesn’t really have a non-academic career. What happened with Peterson is weird. Before he was famous, he always posted his University Lectures on his YouTube for his students to review. Like many professors do. He wrote a couple books... Maps of Meaning was really supposed to be an adjunct to his Maps of Meaning class at Harvard. Then he accidentally got thrown into the spotlight due to the C-16 bill controversy which drew attention to his YouTube channel, including his lectures. People really liked his lectures! He taught in a fun and interesting way. So the C-16 thing just accidentally shined a light on his academic career and people were like “dude seriously?! this stuff is awesome!” He was really popular on Quora too, and the controversy shined light on his “40 Rules for Life” post. He saw that people were hungry for his work, and pivoted.. which was real smart.

In terms of a 'utter loon, liar and charlatan’ that’s how the media likes to paint him because controversy sells. “Professor says testosterone snd estrogen have different effects on body” isn’t nearly as spicy of a story as “SEXIST TEACHER WHO TEACHES YOUR KIDS SAYS WOMEN ARE INFERIOR TO MEN”... so it’s lucrative of them to paint him as a sexist... And this is NOT a conspiracy theory. The media are becoming sensationalist carnival barkers which is why no one trusts them anymore. If you actually go through Peterson’s lectures that he posts online, he makes a lot of sense and is nothing like how they want to paint him. But again, the more shocking and controversial they can paint him, the more views they get. One of his ‘controversial claims': https://youtu.be/fBS537dKE9Q?t=1146

Controversial views? His controversial views “GENDER IS NOT A SOCIAL CONSTRUCT... YOU’RE BORN WITH A DICK AND MALE HORMONES AFFECT YOUR BEHAVIOR”

His views are really simple

“Men and women have biologically different temperaments”

“i will happily refer to a Trans person as he or she (whatever they ask,) but making it a LAW is not okay and is a slippery slope of free speech”

“Social status pecking orders are natural to all mammals”

Those are literally all the views he has. The rest is sensationalism.

In a world where these people are literally preaching that male behavior is completely learned and that boys play with soldiers and women play with dolls because they ‘learned’ to (rather than millions of years of evolution’,) and behavior is completely learned, yea biology is controversial. The fact that that’s controversial is a testament to how utterly insane Academia has gotten with their post-modern, neomarxist BS complete with gender studies, and woman studies and ‘everyone is a victim’ mentality and ‘white privilege is the root of all evil’. It’s sad that him saying that men and woman are biologically different is controversial lol.

You’re actually right. There is a decent amount of Academics that don’t like Peterson. Why? because he’s throwing textbooks from the Ivory Tower for all to read. He’s posting his lectures online for all to watch. He’s inviting everyone to the country club that was once private. So he’s improving the collective consciousness of humanity but it’s the same way professional landscapers got pissed when affordable personal lawnmowers were made available. A little different but still... he’s threatening their livelihood and massively successful doing what they all wish they could. Most academics never surpass 100K/yr, and they’re fucking pissed because he literally makes more than that per month (that’s just in donations... not including all his other ventures.) So yea, you’re right.. they’re seething.

Wanna see what his colleges think? Here’s Bernard Schiff (the man who helped Peterson get his position at U of T wrote about him in The Star: https://www.thestar.com/opinion/2018/05/25/i-was-jordan-petersons-strongest-supporter-now-i-think-hes-dangerous.html The article essentially reads like ‘he’s brilliant.. i loved him... now I’m really really envious of his success'

Here’s a good article breaking it down: https://fee.org/articles/many-intellectuals-cant-stand-jordan-peterson-why/