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On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 09:07 sunprince wrote:On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
[quote]
Of course it applies to us as well. Yes, intelligence is hereditary. These are things we understand quite well. I never said anything different. Except racial factors are extraordinarily minor to intelligence (and are pretty minor in general). Although, technically everyone is a special snowflake because we're all unique. Stop talking about race already. You keep bringing up that strawman to inject emotional arguments related to racism instead of addressing the actual issue. No one is arguing that "racial factors" have anything to do with intelligence; the argument is that genetics and natural selection is relevant to SES (which is affected by, among other things, intelligence). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
What I'm disagreeing with here if your actual statement of these selection effects. The only study you showed me showed very minor effects, and not to anything affecting intelligence. And yet you're the one accusing me ignoring realities. You are the one not being scientifically rigorous here. The evidence we have suggests there could be a very minor effect (maybe only slightly greater than racial factors on intelligence, which is very slim), but it is simply not as massively significant as cultural factors. The study I showed merely demonstrates that humans evolve at a comparable rate to other species. Considering that only 50 years of breeding was enough to produce significant changes in the silver fox, it's not a stretch to argue that several centuries of slavery results in significant effects (not to mention the selection effect behind slave capture). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
Your assumption is that "genetics => intelligence" implies "race => intelligence." This is simply not the way it works. There is massive genetic variability in a race, and the genetic distance between the different races is pathetically small, even to isolated island tribes. Again, stop with the bullshit about "race". It's a strawman. "Race" is not a valid scientific concept (e.g. skin color is not a defining part of genetics). Ethnic groups are (e.g. mitochondrial DNA haplogroups). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
And even more than that, because African Americans are not Africans. They are a hybrid. All humans are hybrids. Nevertheless, reasonable inferences can be made about population clusters based on their general characteristics. How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist. User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:On August 01 2012 11:02 kwizach wrote:On August 01 2012 05:26 xDaunt wrote:
And just because I'm in the mood to start a shitstorm, let me expound upon this a little bit by providing a textbook example of why culture matters with regards to economic success. Let's compare the Asian and African-American communities in the US. Both populations had pretty shitty situations when they came to the US. Blacks were slaves or otherwise indentured servants (or barely better). Asians, though not technically slaves, were treated just as badly and sometimes worse. Hell, the Asians had to deal with laws that prohibited their ownership of real property. Now let's fast forward from the 19th century to now. I don't think anyone would dispute that Asians have been tremendously successful in this country whereas African-Americans, to put it charitably, are still a work in progress. Why is there still such a disparity after many generations?
I posit to you that this disparity is strictly the result of cultural differences between the two populations, and I have yet to hear a satisfactory explanation to the contrary. However, I'm all ears. Erm, the burden of proof lies with the one making the claim. You haven't even defined "culture". What's the Palestinian "culture" and how exactly has it impacted the economic growth of Palestine as opposed to the living conditions of the people and the political status of the entity? I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary.
If you haven't noticed, there is a ridiculous double standard regarding "burdens of proof" in this thread depending upon the idea that you're propounding. In this case, you're going to be hammered unless you provide a dissertation in support of your point.
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On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 09:07 sunprince wrote:On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
[quote]
Of course it applies to us as well. Yes, intelligence is hereditary. These are things we understand quite well. I never said anything different. Except racial factors are extraordinarily minor to intelligence (and are pretty minor in general). Although, technically everyone is a special snowflake because we're all unique. Stop talking about race already. You keep bringing up that strawman to inject emotional arguments related to racism instead of addressing the actual issue. No one is arguing that "racial factors" have anything to do with intelligence; the argument is that genetics and natural selection is relevant to SES (which is affected by, among other things, intelligence). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
What I'm disagreeing with here if your actual statement of these selection effects. The only study you showed me showed very minor effects, and not to anything affecting intelligence. And yet you're the one accusing me ignoring realities. You are the one not being scientifically rigorous here. The evidence we have suggests there could be a very minor effect (maybe only slightly greater than racial factors on intelligence, which is very slim), but it is simply not as massively significant as cultural factors. The study I showed merely demonstrates that humans evolve at a comparable rate to other species. Considering that only 50 years of breeding was enough to produce significant changes in the silver fox, it's not a stretch to argue that several centuries of slavery results in significant effects (not to mention the selection effect behind slave capture). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
Your assumption is that "genetics => intelligence" implies "race => intelligence." This is simply not the way it works. There is massive genetic variability in a race, and the genetic distance between the different races is pathetically small, even to isolated island tribes. Again, stop with the bullshit about "race". It's a strawman. "Race" is not a valid scientific concept (e.g. skin color is not a defining part of genetics). Ethnic groups are (e.g. mitochondrial DNA haplogroups). On August 02 2012 20:52 DoubleReed wrote:
And even more than that, because African Americans are not Africans. They are a hybrid. All humans are hybrids. Nevertheless, reasonable inferences can be made about population clusters based on their general characteristics. How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist. User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:On August 01 2012 11:02 kwizach wrote:On August 01 2012 05:26 xDaunt wrote:
And just because I'm in the mood to start a shitstorm, let me expound upon this a little bit by providing a textbook example of why culture matters with regards to economic success. Let's compare the Asian and African-American communities in the US. Both populations had pretty shitty situations when they came to the US. Blacks were slaves or otherwise indentured servants (or barely better). Asians, though not technically slaves, were treated just as badly and sometimes worse. Hell, the Asians had to deal with laws that prohibited their ownership of real property. Now let's fast forward from the 19th century to now. I don't think anyone would dispute that Asians have been tremendously successful in this country whereas African-Americans, to put it charitably, are still a work in progress. Why is there still such a disparity after many generations?
I posit to you that this disparity is strictly the result of cultural differences between the two populations, and I have yet to hear a satisfactory explanation to the contrary. However, I'm all ears. Erm, the burden of proof lies with the one making the claim. You haven't even defined "culture". What's the Palestinian "culture" and how exactly has it impacted the economic growth of Palestine as opposed to the living conditions of the people and the political status of the entity? I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary.
Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter.
1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade.
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game.
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'.
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors.
So no, I don't think this is a "logical inference," and I don't think you can make this claim at all.
On August 04 2012 06:30 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 09:07 sunprince wrote:[quote] Stop talking about race already. You keep bringing up that strawman to inject emotional arguments related to racism instead of addressing the actual issue. No one is arguing that "racial factors" have anything to do with intelligence; the argument is that genetics and natural selection is relevant to SES (which is affected by, among other things, intelligence). [quote] The study I showed merely demonstrates that humans evolve at a comparable rate to other species. Considering that only 50 years of breeding was enough to produce significant changes in the silver fox, it's not a stretch to argue that several centuries of slavery results in significant effects (not to mention the selection effect behind slave capture). [quote] Again, stop with the bullshit about "race". It's a strawman. "Race" is not a valid scientific concept (e.g. skin color is not a defining part of genetics). Ethnic groups are (e.g. mitochondrial DNA haplogroups). [quote] All humans are hybrids. Nevertheless, reasonable inferences can be made about population clusters based on their general characteristics. How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist. User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:On August 01 2012 11:02 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Erm, the burden of proof lies with the one making the claim. You haven't even defined "culture". What's the Palestinian "culture" and how exactly has it impacted the economic growth of Palestine as opposed to the living conditions of the people and the political status of the entity? I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. If you haven't noticed, there is a ridiculous double standard regarding "burdens of proof" in this thread depending upon the idea that you're propounding. In this case, you're going to be hammered unless you provide a dissertation in support of your point.
I don't get it. He's the one making the claim, and he hasn't provided any evidence whatsoever. It's not like I'm being unfair here. I wouldn't be too surprised if there were studies on this.
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I like how Romney says he paid taxes every year, but not INCOME TAXES. Some wiggle room there...
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On August 04 2012 06:30 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 09:07 sunprince wrote:[quote] Stop talking about race already. You keep bringing up that strawman to inject emotional arguments related to racism instead of addressing the actual issue. No one is arguing that "racial factors" have anything to do with intelligence; the argument is that genetics and natural selection is relevant to SES (which is affected by, among other things, intelligence). [quote] The study I showed merely demonstrates that humans evolve at a comparable rate to other species. Considering that only 50 years of breeding was enough to produce significant changes in the silver fox, it's not a stretch to argue that several centuries of slavery results in significant effects (not to mention the selection effect behind slave capture). [quote] Again, stop with the bullshit about "race". It's a strawman. "Race" is not a valid scientific concept (e.g. skin color is not a defining part of genetics). Ethnic groups are (e.g. mitochondrial DNA haplogroups). [quote] All humans are hybrids. Nevertheless, reasonable inferences can be made about population clusters based on their general characteristics. How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist. User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:On August 01 2012 11:02 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Erm, the burden of proof lies with the one making the claim. You haven't even defined "culture". What's the Palestinian "culture" and how exactly has it impacted the economic growth of Palestine as opposed to the living conditions of the people and the political status of the entity? I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. If you haven't noticed, there is a ridiculous double standard regarding "burdens of proof" in this thread depending upon the idea that you're propounding. In this case, you're going to be hammered unless you provide a dissertation in support of your point.
Hmm, I wonder if there are any historical reasons for why there is an increased burden of proof for proponents of scientific racism...
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One thing that’s important about the new Tax Policy Center study — which found that Mitt Romney’s plan would raise the middle class’ tax burden to pay for a tax cut on the rich — is that this isn’t a he-said-she-said-dispute. One of two things is true:
1) Romney’s proposed across the board tax cut disproportionately benefitting the rich would require, if it is to remain revenue neutral, the closing of loopholes that would mean that the tax burden goes up for people under $200,000. Or:
2) Romney’s plan isn’t actually revenue neutral — it won’t close the loopholes necessary to pay for its tax cuts — which means it would explode the deficit.
This morning, Post fact checker Glenn Kessler gets at this point well in his piece on Obama’s tough new ad hitting Romney’s plan. He concludes that the ad’s claim — that middle class taxes would have to be raised to pay for a tax cut on millionaires like Romney — is accurate.
Kessler dispenses with the Romney campaign’s objections to the study — its allegation of bias and its claim that it has neglected key elements of the plan:
It is ... a bit rich for the Romney plan to complain that the paper does not really examine Romney’s plan — or is missing key elements — when the major problem with the plan is that Romney has released precious few details about it. The Tax Policy Center analysis makes clear that a full review is not possible because “certain components of his plan are not specified in sufficient detail.” In other words, if Romney would actually spell out those details, then a full review would be possible.
(We asked the Romney campaign for such details, but only received talking points criticizing the Tax Policy Center study.)...
The ad concludes by asserting that under Romney’s tax plan, “he pays less, you pay more.” That is the most debatable part of the ad, because Romney insists that under his plan the wealthy will not pay less (or more). He obviously also has not proposed a $2,000 tax increase on middle-class families. But thus far he has not shown how he would achieve his tax goals, so the Obama campaign can certainly call him on his fuzzy math.
Source
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On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 09:07 sunprince wrote:[quote] Stop talking about race already. You keep bringing up that strawman to inject emotional arguments related to racism instead of addressing the actual issue. No one is arguing that "racial factors" have anything to do with intelligence; the argument is that genetics and natural selection is relevant to SES (which is affected by, among other things, intelligence). [quote] The study I showed merely demonstrates that humans evolve at a comparable rate to other species. Considering that only 50 years of breeding was enough to produce significant changes in the silver fox, it's not a stretch to argue that several centuries of slavery results in significant effects (not to mention the selection effect behind slave capture). [quote] Again, stop with the bullshit about "race". It's a strawman. "Race" is not a valid scientific concept (e.g. skin color is not a defining part of genetics). Ethnic groups are (e.g. mitochondrial DNA haplogroups). [quote] All humans are hybrids. Nevertheless, reasonable inferences can be made about population clusters based on their general characteristics. How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist. User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:On August 01 2012 11:02 kwizach wrote:
[quote]
Erm, the burden of proof lies with the one making the claim. You haven't even defined "culture". What's the Palestinian "culture" and how exactly has it impacted the economic growth of Palestine as opposed to the living conditions of the people and the political status of the entity? I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade.
The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery?
On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game.
I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed).
On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'.
Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total.
On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors.
Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know.
The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees).
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On August 04 2012 06:37 HunterX11 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 06:30 xDaunt wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:
[quote]
How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist.
User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:
[quote]
I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. If you haven't noticed, there is a ridiculous double standard regarding "burdens of proof" in this thread depending upon the idea that you're propounding. In this case, you're going to be hammered unless you provide a dissertation in support of your point. Hmm, I wonder if there are any historical reasons for why there is an increased burden of proof for proponents of scientific racism...
You keep saying the word "racism" without any evidence that's being suggested here.
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On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:On August 03 2012 09:13 HunterX11 wrote:
[quote]
How about YOU stop talking about this altogether, you ignorant racist.
User was warned for this post I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince. As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:On August 01 2012 11:08 xDaunt wrote:
[quote]
I already said that a comparison of Isarelis and Palestinians doesn't make for a good test case because of numerous complicating factors. I'm more than happy to talk about blacks and Asians though. I've been pitching that question for over ten years and have never gotten a good response from a liberal. Maybe you can do better. Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently. This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help. TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery?
Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though.
Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed).
I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time.
Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total.
A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population.
Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees).
No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned. As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance.
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On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:On August 03 2012 13:44 RavenLoud wrote:
[quote]
I find it ironic seeing that it was him who started this whole thing by misunderstanding sunprince.
As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself: On August 01 2012 11:52 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
Not a liberal, but I'd argue that the issue here isn't the culture of "blacks" or "Asians" as a group. Rather, one must consider that there are multiple cultures within those groups. For example, if you look deeper into the socioeconomic status of "Asians", you'd find significant differences between Chinese/Indians/Koreans and Vietnamese/Cambodians/Laotians. Similarly, you can find differences between African-Americans descended from slaves and those who immigrated more recently.
This suggests that the "cultural differences" that you point to actually arise from selection effects. Asian immigrants (with the exception of refugee groups) tend to be the best and brightest from their home countries, so Asian-Americans tend to have a culture disposed towards socioeconomic success. By contrast, the Africans who managed to get captured or sold into slavery probably weren't the best and brightest, and several centuries of slaveowners attempting to breed physically fit yet intellectually diminished/obedient slaves probably didn't help.
TL;DR: people who come to America voluntarily tend to be above-average; people who come to America involuntarily tend to be below-average.
As a side note, it's also actually rather interesting that you frame your argument as a conservative one. The fact that you attribute the disparity to strictly cultural differences, rather than as a combination of genetic and cultural differences, strikes me as a rather politically correct liberal explanation already (while the suggestion that genetic factors are at work here is probably controversial, I don't think it's a huge stretch to consider the genetic selection effects of several centuries of slavery). He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness. African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery? Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed). I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total. A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees). No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned.
Your argument is based on faith. I thought we both acknowledged that we don't know what the exact effect of genetics is? On what basis are you concluding that genetic factors are not significant? Given what we know about genetics, the default position is that genetics is a significant factor. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate otherwise.
On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:
As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance.
Seriously? Are you even reading at all? How many times do I have to debunk this factoid until you get it?
Your statement is a strawman because "race" is not a valid scientific concept. Of course there is great genetic variability between people with the same skin color; it's not a valid way of grouping people. But if we use legitimate classifications like haplogroups, then we quickly see why your strawman is wrong.
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Edit: Was way too offtopic. Disregard this post.
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On August 04 2012 20:44 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:On August 03 2012 14:18 HunterX11 wrote:
[quote]
As a reminder in case he edits it later, sunprince posted these words himself:
[quote]
He is not saying that black people are inferior. He is not saying that it is the fault of African-Americans that they are inferior. But he is still saying that they are inferior and that there is even a genetic component to it. If this is a misunderstanding, he hasn't corrected anyone's misunderstanding of his plain and obvious language at all except for claiming that his position is scientific and that disagreeing is motivated by political correctness.
African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages. The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation. TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence. What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 03 2012 21:42 DoubleReed wrote:
Well sunprince kind of distracted us from Mr. Stereotypes-are-Valid xDaunt. Though we already shot down all of xDaunt's arguments, and he basically accepted defeat so there wasn't much to say. I feel like sunprince was just absolutely refusing to clarify his position and instead yammering on about political correctness, which is the kind of bullshit that racists say. I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that. Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery? Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed). I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total. A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees). No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned. Your argument is based on faith. I thought we both acknowledged that we don't know what the exact effect of genetics is? On what basis are you concluding that genetic factors are not significant? Given what we know about genetics, the default position is that genetics is a significant factor. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate otherwise. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:
As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance. Seriously? Are you even reading at all? How many times do I have to debunk this factoid until you get it? Your statement is a strawman because "race" is not a valid scientific concept. Of course there is great genetic variability between people with the same skin color; it's not a valid way of grouping people. But if we use legitimate classifications like haplogroups, then we quickly see why your strawman is wrong.
Genetics are a significant factor is the default position? No, it doesn't work like that. We don't just assume that poor people are genetically predisposed to being poor. That's the opposite of default. That's something that needs some kind of evidence. That's Social Darwinism. You can't even find studies about the most basic parts of your claims to be true, and you're telling me that you're using logical inference.
Based on faith? Are you for real? Are you serious? You have yet to show any evidence, and you're telling me that my arguments are based on faith. My argument is based on skepticism. I don't believe claims with a lack of evidence. It's not like the evidence would be impossible to obtain or anything, in fact with the traits you said we probably have done studies on that. The evidence I see is that the genetic variability within African Americans wouldn't make them any less 'genetically prone to lower socioeconomic status,' (whatever that means) than the majority population. I'm sorry, this is nothing but wild speculation, compounded with many layers of gross assumptions.
So tell me, which of the haplogroups is African Americans?
And wait, so you can define haplogroups this way, but I'm pretty sure the statement still correct? Genetic Variability still is higher than Genetic Distance even within haplogroups (they seem to be based on direct lineage). As in, just being part of the group does not necessarily mean that generalizations about the groups genetics are going to work. It looks like these are just used as genetic markers to find migration patterns and lineages. They could have minimal to zero effect on development. In fact they're more likely to, considering that that's what makes good genetic markers.
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For the 'racial' debate, the latest study I heard about intelligence, was that african-american are on average 10 IQ points below whites, while asians are a few points above. Intelligence is hereditary; and comparing Africa to Europe, it would make sense that, in Africa, intelligence did not equal survival and adaptability as much as it did in Europe the past, oh, 1000 years. As for evolution during actual period of slavery, it was much too short for any noticable evolution to take effect, if anyone suggested this.
Ofcourse, noticing a trend does not mean the numbers are exact in every (or any) study.
edit: imo there's more to race than simply skin colour. Equating race with skin colour makes no sense in my eyes. What I'm saying is that there's "race", and there's race: Obviously everybody are slightly different, but we can categorize certain groups which are slightly more similar; doesn't have to be simply skin colour: For instance where this 'race' evolved and how 'it' evolved plays a role in its current state evolution. E.g: We categorize animals this way; not to use as a tool for discrimination.
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On August 04 2012 22:11 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 20:44 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 02:14 sunprince wrote:
[quote]
African-Americans have lower socio-economic status because the selection effects of slavery have left them genetically/culturally/historically predisposed towards lower socioeconomic status. This doesn't imply they are inferior as a population group, the same way that Asian-American genetic/cultural/historical selection effects leaving them predisposed towards lesser political status doesn't imply that Asian-Americans are an inferior population group. Every population group has a unique set of advantages and disadvantages.
The point about political correctness is that libtards who believe in cultural determinism completely deny that genetic selection has any effect, when in truth it's one of a number of causes for the present situation.
TL;DR: Saying that Protoss has a weaker economy doesn't imply that you think Protoss is an inferior race; it's just a statement of fact that certain fanboy noobs will insist isn't true despite the evidence.
What? How does that not imply that? If they are " genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:
[quote]
I've clarified my position repeatedly. If by "refusing to clarify", you mean "refusing to apologize in the face of accusations of racism", then sure, I refused to do that.
Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery? Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed). I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total. A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees). No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned. Your argument is based on faith. I thought we both acknowledged that we don't know what the exact effect of genetics is? On what basis are you concluding that genetic factors are not significant? Given what we know about genetics, the default position is that genetics is a significant factor. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate otherwise. On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:
As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance. Seriously? Are you even reading at all? How many times do I have to debunk this factoid until you get it? Your statement is a strawman because "race" is not a valid scientific concept. Of course there is great genetic variability between people with the same skin color; it's not a valid way of grouping people. But if we use legitimate classifications like haplogroups, then we quickly see why your strawman is wrong. Genetics are a significant factor is the default position? No, it doesn't work like that. We don't just assume that poor people are genetically predisposed to being poor. That's the opposite of default. That's something that needs some kind of evidence. That's Social Darwinism. You can't even find studies about the most basic parts of your claims to be true, and you're telling me that you're using logical inference. Based on faith? Are you for real? Are you serious? You have yet to show any evidence, and you're telling me that my arguments are based on faith. My argument is based on skepticism. I don't believe claims with a lack of evidence. It's not like the evidence would be impossible to obtain or anything, in fact with the traits you said we probably have done studies on that. The evidence I see is that the genetic variability within African Americans wouldn't make them any less 'genetically prone to lower socioeconomic status,' (whatever that means) than the majority population. I'm sorry, this is nothing but wild speculation, compounded with many layers of gross assumptions.
We've established the following premises:
1. Genetics influence human traits.
2. Human traits influence socioeconomic outcomes.
3. Culture also influences socioeconomic outcomes.
Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that socioeconomic outcomes are influenced by both "nature" and "nurture" (African-Americans additionally suffer from the historical effects of slavery followed by widespread discrimination). Of course, we might revise this logical inference when and if we get experimental data on this topic, but for the time being this conclusion is logically reasonable.
Despite this, you seem to be arguing that human traits don't signficantly influence socioeconomic outcomes in the specific case of African-Americans. Unless you can explain why this would uniquely qualify as an exception to the above premises and conclusion, it makes no sense to go with your argument. The burden of proof is on you to establish why the socio-economic status of African-Americans are an exception to the reality shared by every other population group with regards to every other human trait.
On August 04 2012 22:11 DoubleReed wrote:
So tell me, which of the haplogroups is African Americans?
Mostly L2 and L3, although of course given their unique history, African-Americans as a general group are a subset that diverged several centuries ago.
On August 04 2012 22:11 DoubleReed wrote:And wait, so you can define haplogroups this way, but I'm pretty sure the statement still correct? Genetic Variability still is higher than Genetic Distance even within haplogroups (they seem to be based on direct lineage). As in, just being part of the group does not necessarily mean that generalizations about the groups genetics are going to work. It looks like these are just used as genetic markers to find migration patterns and lineages. They could have minimal to zero effect on development. In fact they're more likely to, considering that that's what makes good genetic markers.
Unlike "race" (which is fundamentally flawed because skin color is based on extremely superficial genetic differences), genetic variability is less within haplogroups than between different haplogroups. This understanding of population genetics is what has allowed us to make recent discoveries such as Neanderthal admixture (e.g. non-African populations have ~1-4% Neanderthal DNA, while African populations do not).
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On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
For the 'racial' debate, the latest study I heard about intelligence, was that african-american are on average 10 IQ points below whites, while asians are a few points above. Intelligence is hereditary; and comparing Africa to Europe, it would make sense that, in Africa, intelligence did not equal survival and adaptability as much as it did in Europe the past, oh, 1000 years.
Intelligence isn't solely hereditary, however; we also know that cultural/environemental factors also signifcantly affect intelligence.
On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
As for evolution during actual period of slavery, it was much too short for any noticable evolution to take effect, if anyone suggested this.
False. I previously linked a study that shows selection pressures do affect evolution even over a single generation provided that the selection pressure is reasonably strong. As slavery was certainly an overwelmingly powerful selection pressure, and it took place over many generations, it is very likely that it caused noticeable genetic effects.
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On August 04 2012 23:10 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
For the 'racial' debate, the latest study I heard about intelligence, was that african-american are on average 10 IQ points below whites, while asians are a few points above. Intelligence is hereditary; and comparing Africa to Europe, it would make sense that, in Africa, intelligence did not equal survival and adaptability as much as it did in Europe the past, oh, 1000 years. Intelligence isn't solely hereditary, however; we also know that cultural/environemental factors also signifcantly affect intelligence. Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
As for evolution during actual period of slavery, it was much too short for any noticable evolution to take effect, if anyone suggested this. This is false. I linked a study that selection pressures do affect evolution even over a single generation provided that the selection pressure is reasonably strong (and slavery is certainly an overwhelmingly powerful selection pressure).
I would emphasize that intelligence is mostly hereditary; more so than enviromental. Ofc you can train yourself for an IQ test, or be prepared for one through your enviroment, but this can ofc be filtered out of a study, and isn't part of what I'm talking about.
As for the second paragraph you quoted, you can have right on that one; I don't know enough. Obviously since slavery began up until now the time span is (probably) large enough that you will see some differences from their original race. As for simply one generation: I'm not sure I comprehend, or can attribute to, how slavery affected evolution. In a way, within the african-american "community" of slaves, everyone was quite 'equal' in standing. No certain trait was more prone to evolve; because the outcome of their lives was (mainly?) determined by their masters. Their survivability was more a random process not attributed to their genes.
At some point an individual has to stop blaming their surroundings. Yes, things will (possibly) be tougher and harder, there will be more setbacks and pain; but you're still gonna be responsible for your own life: Saying someone else is responsible for it is the same as not aknowledging that your life is yours: You attribute it to everyone else. At best we can give everyone "equal opportunities" (we've basically done this in Norway), but in the US all you can hope to achieve is to give everyone a fighting chance. And in a way, because there's access to free education; much of the groundwork has been laid. And why asians prospered and blacks prospered less cannot entirely be blamed on social factors: Because this suggests that society needs to adapt to the point where everyone can prosper and this can simply not be the case. Currently a "certain type" of people will prosper (within the frame of society). Some deserve it, some probably don't (i.e some who are born into wealth and privilege). But some simply will not prosper. Will not want to prosper. Will not want to live in a world such as ours is; and for now we cannot change everything to make sure they get everything they want. What we can do, and should do, is make sure they don't starve and freeze, and have some form of safety-net. Offer help to those who wish it (schooling is one way to do this for isntance); and make sure that hard work is rewarded, since this is what USA is all about, atleast in theory, while perhaps not in practice.
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On August 04 2012 23:06 sunprince wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 22:11 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 20:44 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:
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What? How does that not imply that? If they are "genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic status" then how does that not imply they are inferior as a population group??? Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen? On August 04 2012 03:13 DoubleReed wrote:
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Well apologies don't make sense, assuming you aren't a racist. But constantly talking about "politically correct libtards" makes you look like a unabashed racist regardless of your argument (and your argument shouldn't even be that strong if you want to talk about accuracy). I don't really know why you want to do that to yourself. It makes me think you haven't had discussions or exposure with actual racists. I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals. Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery? Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed). I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total. A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees). No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned. Your argument is based on faith. I thought we both acknowledged that we don't know what the exact effect of genetics is? On what basis are you concluding that genetic factors are not significant? Given what we know about genetics, the default position is that genetics is a significant factor. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate otherwise. On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:
As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance. Seriously? Are you even reading at all? How many times do I have to debunk this factoid until you get it? Your statement is a strawman because "race" is not a valid scientific concept. Of course there is great genetic variability between people with the same skin color; it's not a valid way of grouping people. But if we use legitimate classifications like haplogroups, then we quickly see why your strawman is wrong. Genetics are a significant factor is the default position? No, it doesn't work like that. We don't just assume that poor people are genetically predisposed to being poor. That's the opposite of default. That's something that needs some kind of evidence. That's Social Darwinism. You can't even find studies about the most basic parts of your claims to be true, and you're telling me that you're using logical inference. Based on faith? Are you for real? Are you serious? You have yet to show any evidence, and you're telling me that my arguments are based on faith. My argument is based on skepticism. I don't believe claims with a lack of evidence. It's not like the evidence would be impossible to obtain or anything, in fact with the traits you said we probably have done studies on that. The evidence I see is that the genetic variability within African Americans wouldn't make them any less 'genetically prone to lower socioeconomic status,' (whatever that means) than the majority population. I'm sorry, this is nothing but wild speculation, compounded with many layers of gross assumptions. We've established the following premises: 1. Genetics influence human traits. 2. Human traits influence socioeconomic outcomes. 3. Culture also influences socioeconomic outcomes. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that socioeconomic outcomes are influenced by both "nature" and "nurture" (African-Americans additionally suffer from the historical effects of slavery followed by widespread discrimination). Of course, we might revise this logical inference when and if we get experimental data on this topic, but for the time being this conclusion is logically reasonable. Despite this, you seem to be arguing that human traits don't signficantly influence socioeconomic outcomes in the specific case of African-Americans. Unless you can explain why this would uniquely qualify as an exception to the above premises and conclusion, it makes no sense to go with your argument. The burden of proof is on you to establish why the socio-economic status of African-Americans are an exception to the reality shared by every other population group with regards to every other human trait.
No, I'm saying you're trying to explain the modern outcomes of a poorly-defined racial group (because we are talking about African Americans here, which even in haplogroups it's pretty silly) based on selection processes which may not have negatively affected them in that way, compared to white people at the same time (because white people are also undergoing selection processes even without slavery).
I'm totally with you in terms of those premises. What I'm saying is that your grouping and theory of selection within this grouping makes very little sense given what we know about how genetics works. There's no reason to assume that African Americans are genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic group. It's not like the majority of poor people are black, or the majority of black people are poor. It's just that black people have a higher proportion of poor people. Cultural factors could easily explain the disparity without any odd genetic theories, considering that almost all African Americans are part-white anyway. And of course, culturally it is just black and white, without haplogroups.
Of course, we might revise this logical inference when and if we get experimental data on this topic, but for the time being this conclusion is logically reasonable.
This is opposite of the way science works. The default position is skepticism, regardless of your theoretical concoction. You need evidence to hold a position.
And I'm sorry, but I would like a link to something that says haplogroups have less genetic distance than genetic variability. I couldn't find it with a quick search. The only I found said that it was about lineages, which makes it a valid scientific grouping, but that would not say anything about its variability.
But yeesh, we should take this to PM.
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On August 04 2012 23:50 DoubleReed wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 23:06 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 22:11 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 20:44 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 11:29 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 06:35 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 04:42 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:On August 04 2012 03:24 sunprince wrote:
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Because there's more to life than socioeconomic status. Are engineers inferior to businessmen?
[quote]
I've dealt with plenty of racists, including in violent face-to-face encounters (as an ethnic minority myself). This doesn't change the fact that I have a strong distaste for people who try to shut down logical debate with fallacies and insults, whether they are bigoted religous conservatives, or culturally deterministic liberals.
Blindly crying "racism" when someone talks about ethnic issues is about as legtimate as blindly crying "antisemitism" whenever Israel is criticized, or "misogynist" when feminists are criticized. I'm sorry, I didn't think you were implying that blacks were genetically predisposed towards engineering... I'm sure you actually understood that the analogy was pointing out that differences in socioeconomic status do not imply superiority or inferiority. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:Look, you show me evidence of something like that, then I'll change my tune. But what you've shown me so far is wild speculation. What I've said is a logical inference given contemporary understanding of genetic and cultural selection effects, in the absence of any studies to suggest the contrary. Ugh, I am between conceding for the sake of being ending this topic and arguing for the sake of how many baseless assumptions you'd have to make before that is true. And of course, because I like wasting my time, let's go with the latter. 1. You'd have to assume that significant selection was occurring. Admittedly, that's sort of assumed with evolution, but things like slavery and how super-awesome humans are at surviving complicate things a bit. The study you showed was resistance to certain diseases, which you would be expected even without a slave trade. The study I linked illustrates that there was a significant selection process over a single generation even in spite of modern technology (particularly medical science) sustaining unfit individuals who would otherwise have perished. Given that this is the case, how can you deny that significant selection would occur given the far greater number of generations as well as the far stronger selection pressures of slave capture and slavery? Well, selection to survive disease would obviously be more significant over a shorter number of generations, but sure. I don't see how slave capture and slavery is necessarily a strong selection pressure though. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
2. You'd have to assume that the traits being favored while they were slaves would have negative impacts on them once they were no longer slaves. I'm not quite sure how you get around this idea, because traits like "hard working" would generally be favored here, while traits like "violent behavior" would be generally less favored. That doesn't exactly fit our stereotypes. And genetics definitely have a role to play in terms of our personality, so those traits, while simplified, are fair game. I haven't claimed to support any "stereotypes" that you suggest. Generally speaking, though, the selection process of slave capture and slavery would likely select in favor of traits such as physical strength/endurance, earler puberty (which we know results in lower SES outcomes), and fecundity (which plays a big role in reinforcing the cycle of poverty), while selecting against traits such as intellectual curiosity (slaves who attempted to learn were brutally suppressed). I was partly joking about the stereotypes. But is there evidence suggesting that modern blacks have those traits? That seems like a relatively easy thing to find out and have evidence for. Like, you have a claim, and here's a great way to check it. Selection pressures aren't exactly simplistic, you could easily be wrong that those traits necessarily would have been chosen more than common white people at the time. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
3. We should not pretend as if white people did not have children with black people during slavery, because the fact is it was rather common. Black people were far from an isolated population during this 'selection process'. Genetic studies indicate that current African-Americans inherited only ~14-17% of their ancestry from Europeans. So while we certainly do know that many slaveowners and overseers took sexual liberties with their slaves, this did not constitute a majority of the genetic total. A majority wouldn't make sense, and is not needed for me to throw a wrench in your claims. (Actually the things I've seen put it more at 20% but whatever). 14-17% is actually pretty significant. The population simply was not isolated very much. It's more likely that they became more similar to the white people during this time, rather than less. As often happens with minority subpopulations, they became more hybridized with the majority population. On August 04 2012 04:08 DoubleReed wrote:
4. With all these concerns, you would need to show that the genetic factors are not only there, but of noticeable significance compared with nurture and cultural factors. Nurture = cultural factors; I think what you meant to say was historical. Yes, genetic factors are only a part of the picture here, alongside cultural and historic factors. That said, it's a rather naieve P.C. argument to suggest that genetic factors aren't in play at all, considering what we do know. The argument from ignorance you're making is no different from the European feminsts insisting that there are no differences between men and women except the external one, and that everything is culturally determined. It completely falls apart given what we know about biology, and is a far more extreme position than the default assumption that both nature and nurture each play a role (to unknown degrees). No, I'm not making these arguments. What I'm saying is that genetic factors are far insignificant compared to social factors in these cases. At least as far as the population of black people is concerned. Your argument is based on faith. I thought we both acknowledged that we don't know what the exact effect of genetics is? On what basis are you concluding that genetic factors are not significant? Given what we know about genetics, the default position is that genetics is a significant factor. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate otherwise. On August 04 2012 12:07 DoubleReed wrote:
As I have said repeatedly, genetic variability within a race is far greater than the genetic distance. Seriously? Are you even reading at all? How many times do I have to debunk this factoid until you get it? Your statement is a strawman because "race" is not a valid scientific concept. Of course there is great genetic variability between people with the same skin color; it's not a valid way of grouping people. But if we use legitimate classifications like haplogroups, then we quickly see why your strawman is wrong. Genetics are a significant factor is the default position? No, it doesn't work like that. We don't just assume that poor people are genetically predisposed to being poor. That's the opposite of default. That's something that needs some kind of evidence. That's Social Darwinism. You can't even find studies about the most basic parts of your claims to be true, and you're telling me that you're using logical inference. Based on faith? Are you for real? Are you serious? You have yet to show any evidence, and you're telling me that my arguments are based on faith. My argument is based on skepticism. I don't believe claims with a lack of evidence. It's not like the evidence would be impossible to obtain or anything, in fact with the traits you said we probably have done studies on that. The evidence I see is that the genetic variability within African Americans wouldn't make them any less 'genetically prone to lower socioeconomic status,' (whatever that means) than the majority population. I'm sorry, this is nothing but wild speculation, compounded with many layers of gross assumptions. We've established the following premises: 1. Genetics influence human traits. 2. Human traits influence socioeconomic outcomes. 3. Culture also influences socioeconomic outcomes. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that socioeconomic outcomes are influenced by both "nature" and "nurture" (African-Americans additionally suffer from the historical effects of slavery followed by widespread discrimination). Of course, we might revise this logical inference when and if we get experimental data on this topic, but for the time being this conclusion is logically reasonable. Despite this, you seem to be arguing that human traits don't signficantly influence socioeconomic outcomes in the specific case of African-Americans. Unless you can explain why this would uniquely qualify as an exception to the above premises and conclusion, it makes no sense to go with your argument. The burden of proof is on you to establish why the socio-economic status of African-Americans are an exception to the reality shared by every other population group with regards to every other human trait. No, I'm saying you're trying to explain the modern outcomes of a poorly-defined racial group (because we are talking about African Americans here, which even in haplogroups it's pretty silly) based on selection processes which may not have negatively affected them in that way, compared to white people at the same time (because white people are also undergoing selection processes even without slavery). I'm totally with you in terms of those premises. What I'm saying is that your grouping and theory of selection within this grouping makes very little sense given what we know about how genetics works. There's no reason to assume that African Americans are genetically predisposed to a lower socioeconomic group. It's not like the majority of poor people are black, or the majority of black people are poor. It's just that black people have a higher proportion of poor people. Show nested quote +Of course, we might revise this logical inference when and if we get experimental data on this topic, but for the time being this conclusion is logically reasonable. This is opposite of the way science works. The default position is skepticism, regardless of your theoretical concoction. You need evidence to hold a position. And I'm sorry, but I would like a link to something that says haplogroups have less genetic distance than genetic variability. I couldn't find it with a quick search. The only I found said that it was about lineages, which makes it a valid scientific grouping, but that would not say anything about its variability.
I'm not privy to the details of your discussion, but based on what you're saying, "empirical" data would suggest that african americans are having slightly more trouble adapting to the current society because they have a proportionally larger amount of poor people.
This could be credited to that africa had a different evolutionary path. Africans are stronger within that enviroment and not neccesarily within "our" current enviroment. They didn't evolve here and so their gene selection wasn't based upon adaptation towards our current society. Doesn't explain why they are at exactly where they're at. Simply means they will, in llikelihood, be in a different place than those who evolved around and developed our current society. "Empirical" evidence then tells us where they're at. We then must adapt society to accomodate for this SOME, not entirely.
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On August 04 2012 23:28 Kakaw wrote:Show nested quote +On August 04 2012 23:10 sunprince wrote:On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
For the 'racial' debate, the latest study I heard about intelligence, was that african-american are on average 10 IQ points below whites, while asians are a few points above. Intelligence is hereditary; and comparing Africa to Europe, it would make sense that, in Africa, intelligence did not equal survival and adaptability as much as it did in Europe the past, oh, 1000 years. Intelligence isn't solely hereditary, however; we also know that cultural/environemental factors also signifcantly affect intelligence. On August 04 2012 22:42 Kakaw wrote:
As for evolution during actual period of slavery, it was much too short for any noticable evolution to take effect, if anyone suggested this. This is false. I linked a study that selection pressures do affect evolution even over a single generation provided that the selection pressure is reasonably strong (and slavery is certainly an overwhelmingly powerful selection pressure). I would emphasize that intelligence is mostly hereditary; more so than enviromental. Ofc you can train yourself for an IQ test, or be prepared for one through your enviroment, but this can ofc be filtered out of a study, and isn't part of what I'm talking about. As for the second paragraph you quoted, you can have right on that one; I don't know enough. Obviously since slavery began up until now the time span is (probably) large enough that you will see some differences from their original race. As for simply one generation: I'm not sure I comprehend, or can attribute to, how slavery affected evolution. In a way, within the african-american "community" of slaves, everyone was quite 'equal' in standing. No certain trait was more prone to evolve; because the outcome of their lives was (mainly?) determined by their masters. Their survivability was more a random process not attributed to their genes.
Just because everyone in a community has equal standing does not mean that they have an equal chance to survive/reproduce. For example, some Africans were captured as slaves while others were not; African-Americans are predominately the descendants of those who are captured. Do you not think this is a substantial selection pressure?
Survival is not a random processs, even when the outcome of your lives are determined externally. The survival of most domesticated species is determined by humans, yet it is obvious that the outcome is not random. Certain traits such as physical strength/endurance, earlier puberty/greater fecundity, and an aversion to intellectual curiosity, are more likely to result in a the survival of a slave and increase their chances of reproducing.
On August 04 2012 23:28 Kakaw wrote:
At some point an individual has to stop blaming their surroundings. Yes, things will (possibly) be tougher and harder, there will be more setbacks and pain; but you're still gonna be responsible for your own life: Saying someone else is responsible for it is the same as not aknowledging that your life is yours: You attribute it to everyone else. At best we can give everyone "equal opportunities" (we've basically done this in Norway), but in the US all you can hope to achieve is to give everyone a fighting chance. And in a way, because there's access to free education; much of the groundwork has been laid. And why asians prospered and blacks prospered less cannot entirely be blamed on social factors: Because this suggests that society needs to adapt to the point where everyone can prosper and this can simply not be the case. Currently a "certain type" of people will prosper (within the frame of society). Some deserve it, some probably don't (i.e some who are born into wealth and privilege). But some simply will not prosper. Will not want to prosper. Will not want to live in a world such as ours is; and for now we cannot change everything to make sure they get everything they want. What we can do, and should do, is make sure they don't starve and freeze, and have some form of safety-net. Offer help to those who wish it (schooling is one way to do this for isntance); and make sure that hard work is rewarded, since this is what USA is all about, atleast in theory, while perhaps not in practice.
While I don't entirely disagree, you're missing a key point here: it's desirable to provide equality of opportunity. Once we understand and accept why African-Americans have been disadvantaged, we can enact policies to undo these selection effects. Stronger public education systems and greater higher education opportunities increases the likelihood that African-Americans with higher socioeconomic potential will actually realize that potential and the survival/reproductive advantages it enables. Greater access to and encouragement of birth control usage reduces the frequently negative effects of African-Americans having children earlier than average. Fostering positive attitudes towards intelligence, rather than attitudes that belittle it, increases the sexual success of more intelligent individuals (and let's face it, this is something that anti-intellectual Americans could use in general).
Sure, it's easy to dismiss the problems of African-Americans by insisting that it's their own problem now that we have institutional equality. But let's not forget that Americans as a whole benefit disproportionately (due to the logarithmic nature of cost-effectiveness) when we help those who are least fortunate to improve their circumstances. Greater socioeconomic equality means greater economic output, greater social harmony, less identity politics, and less crime for everyone.
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On August 05 2012 00:01 sunprince wrote:
While I don't entirely disagree, you're missing a key point here: it's desirable to provide equality of opportunity. By understanding why African-Americans have been disadvantaged, we can attempt to rectify the issues.
For example, once we understand and accept that African-Americans have been subjected to negative selection pressures, we can enact policies to undo them. Stronger public education systems and greater higher education opportunities increases the likelihood that African-Americans with higher socioeconomic potential will actually realize that potential and the survival/reproductive advantages it enables. Greater access to and encouragement of birth control usage reduces the frequently negative effects of African-Americans having children earlier than average. Fostering positive attitudes towards intelligence, rather than attitudes that belittle it, increases the sexual success of more intelligent individuals (and let's face it, this is something that anti-intellectual Americans could use in general).
Sure, it's easy to dismiss the problems of African-Americans by insisting that it's their own problem. But let's not forget that Americans as a whole benefit disproportionately (due to the logarithmic nature of cost-effectiveness) when we help those who are least fortunate to improve their circumstances. Greater socioeconomic equality means greater economic output, greater social harmony, less identity politics, and less crime for everyone.
This is in essence what I said. I only assumed that 100% equal opportunity was not actually realistic in the current US of A. Actual 100% isn't realistic anywhere at any time, but just because I didn't use concrete examples, I still said the same thing as you, atleast that was my intention 
The foundation is there. Someone just has to be willing to include them as they are (politicians.. and people). It does mean that society must adapt to their needs; and, as I come from Norway, it's something that can be overdone. Not that it will be the case in the current USA... Here we have overstepped and gone too far. Depending on social distributions, certain under-represented groups will actually get extra benefits and special considerations: Simply because one believes that the reason for there being less girls in engineering is attributed to male dominance based on feminist view points: So society has to adapt unnaturally to such groups (this was simply an example; this fluctuate alot. But our philosophy is clear: Those who do not have, we provide for. Those who are not respresented we push in even if they aren't qualified or competative within the enviroment). My point was that this is simply taking it too far. That there's a limit to how far you should adapt. And USA won't come close to this in the nearest future.
..In a way I view Norway as a social experiment. How far can we go before we realize that we're going against core human nature. And how fast we will be able to change our ways once the world is no longer dependent on our oil. Cause for now we can aford anything we want to do, therefore I call it an experiment. Given enough money and financial security, this is the path we choose. Some countries can't finance themselves this greatly on their oil (we're only about 5 milion people here), or have their money tied up elsewhere (sheiks and corruption for instance). So while we're probably the most fair country when it comes to distributing the wealth from the oil, we're not being entirely correct in our "philosophies". This is our great "paradox": We have given everyone equal opportunities, yet there are still discrepancies! This is (for some reason I don't udnerstand) viewed upon as a failure. That more has to be done! We haven't reached our goals they say. When in fact their goals are highly unrealistic and unnatural. People are infact different, but this is taboo.
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