It can, but the notion that ignorance can triumph by force is not the fault of the universities. What is their alternative? To pander to people who believe that Islamic terrorists are a greater threat to them than the ladder in their garage, that being gay is a conscious moral choice, and that tax cuts stimulate economic growth? Conservative backlash against science and mathematics is a consequence of the increasing availability of data directly contradicting most of their core intuitive beliefs. That they're choosing to shoot the messenger is not the messenger's fault.

>To pander to people who believe that Islamic terrorists are a greater threat to them than the ladder in their garage

A poor straw man argument, and it's telling that you need untruthful hyperbole to make your point.

In what sense is it a straw man argument? Republicans favor spending enormous amounts of money fighting Islamic terrorists, while ignoring much more probable threats. That is not hyperbole, it is sad truth.

Compare the rate for both of those aggregated over the last 5 years to the previous 5 years.

Or you can simply look at the probability of various causes of death: http://www.businessinsider.com/death-risk-statistics-terrori.... They don't specifically have ladder deaths, but at about 300/year, it would rank between heat waves and electricity on the list.