A contrarian is a person who takes up a contrary position, a person who seems to be contrary for the sake of being contrary, especially a position that is opposed to that of the majority, regardless of how unpopular it may be. [ 1 ] It is similar to iconoclasm ; attacking or openly rejecting cherished beliefs and institutions or established values and practices, but unlike the contrarian, the motive is not simply to be contrary or a tool to incite discussion. Contrarian styles of argument and disagreement have historically been associated with radicalism and dissent. [ citation needed ]

Contents

§ Contrarian tropes in journalism [ edit ]

Contrarian journalism is characterised by articles and books making counter-intuitive claims, or attacking what is said to be the conventional wisdom (a phrase attributed to John Kenneth Galbraith ) on a given topic. A typical contrarian trope takes the form everything you know about topic X is wrong. [ 2 ]

Slate . the left-leaning online current affairs and culture magazine, inspired a set of parodic proposed contrarian titles appearing on Twitter with the hashtag #slatepitches following its publication of an article in defense of the critically-maligned post-grunge band Creed. [ 3 ]

§ Supporters and critics [ edit ]

Paul Krugman. an economist and columnist for The New York Times . has criticised contrarianism without consequences in relation to the debate over global warming and the controversy over the book Superfreakonomics . saying The refusal of the Superfreakonomists to take responsibility for their failed attempt to be cleverly contrarian on climate change is a sad spectacle to watch. having paraded their daring contrarianism, the freakonomists are trying to wiggle out of the consequences when it turns out that they were wrong. [ 4 ]

§ Contrarianism in science [ edit ]

In science. the term contrarian is often applied to those who reject a general scientific consensus on some particular issue, as well as to scientists who pursue research strategies which are rejected by most researchers in the field. [ citation needed ] Contrarians are particularly prominent in cases where scientific evidence bears on political, social or cultural controversies such as disputes over policy responses to climate change. or creationism versus evolution. [ citation needed ]

Writers on scientific topics commonly described as contrarian include David Berlinski. a critic of mainstream views on evolution, [ citation needed ] and Richard Lindzen. a critic of the scientific consensus on climate change [ citation needed ]. Bjørn Lomborg. who accepts the scientific consensus on climate change, but argues against action to mitigate it, has been called the poster boy of the contrarian trend. [ 5 ]

§ Contrarian investing [ edit ]

A contrarian investing style is one that is based on identifying, and speculating against, movements in stock prices that reflect changes in the sentiments of the majority of investors. [ citation needed ]