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comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T16:20:58.164Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I was too much of an asshole; here it is in comment form.

I'm taking a 24 hour break, thom. I was over worked up, and I let it spill into this comment thread, overreacting to what people said.

I've probably acted like a jerk. not completely devoid of purpose, but a jerk nonetheless. I'd like to apologize for all of that. I had no call to be so rude to all of you.

Gah. I suppose I should repost this to the top.

Replies from: RobertLumley, None
comment by RobertLumley · 2012-05-11T18:23:36.145Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Thank you for your apology. While you weren't rude to me, since I didn't get in on any of this, I had been pretty heavily downvoting you for your hostility. I was planning on looking through the thread in more detail to make sure I hadn't missed anything I thought should be downvoted, but I'm going to refrain from doing that now, and I've removed some downvotes I had made.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-06-10T07:23:41.614Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That is decent of you, sir.

Nonetheless, I do not believe that this is the place for me. I support and admire your mission of raising the Rationality Waterline, but I am a man who belongs in the trenches. Best I can do is use your Dark Side teachings, and send the occasional padwan in your direction to learn the Vicious Arts.

Grant me your prayers as I fight against the insufferable Good within the world.

Replies from: RobertLumley
comment by RobertLumley · 2012-06-10T08:14:52.112Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Sorry to see you go, even despite this thread. You were obviously making an attempt, as evidenced by your apology, and I'm sad to see anyone leave when I think there's a possibility that they can fit in with the community.

For what it's worth, I hope your real plan is to make a new account that will not be associated with this post, although I doubt anyone actually remembers your username well enough to automatically associate it with this incident.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T22:58:55.090Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I have a habit of retracting my comments once I no longer agree with my past self. You might find that a worthwhile endeavour.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-06-10T07:17:35.505Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Oh, believe me, I shit the bed on this.

I was still all ornery from the last time here; I let that get into my blood, and overreacted. I've only recently attained any internet prominence, and this was my first time experiencing hate. Despite all the mental preparations... I reacted poorly.

I prefer to own my failures, however; I fucked up three weeks ago. Anyone can see that.

As I said to another commenter - I suspect that I am better as a beacon for rationality, pointing new pilgrims to his place, than I am a member of the community.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-06-10T12:09:56.518Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I guess I am less attached to person-continuity than most. I generally regard two or three months forward and backward in time as the limit to calling the program run by this computational architecture "me," shorter in the vicinity of major insights. Outside this timeframe I see it perfectly acceptable to blame "past me" and have obligations towards "future me."

comment by JackV · 2012-05-11T15:32:58.969Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Let me try to summarise the obvious parts of the situation as I understand it. I contend that:

(A) There are some measureable differences between ethnicities that are most plausibly attributed to biological differences. (There are some famous examples, such as greater susceptibility of some people to skin cancer, or sickle cell anemia. I assume there are smaller differences elsewhere. If anyone seriously disagrees, say so.)

(B) These are massively dwarfed by the correlation of ethnicity with cultural differences in almost all cases.

(C) There is a social taboo against admitting (A)

(D) There is a large correlation between ethnicity and various cultural factors, and between cultural factors.

(E) It is sometimes possible to draw probabalistic inferences based on (D). Eg. With no other information, you may guess that someone on the street in London is more likely to be a British citizen if they are Indian than East Asian (or vice versa, whichever is true).

(F) The human brain deals very badly with probabalistic inferences. If you guess someone's culture based on their ethnicity or dress, you are likely to maintain that view as long as possible even in the face of new information, until you suddenly flip to the opposite view. Because of this, there is (rightly IMHO) a social taboo against doing (E) even when it might make sense.

(G) People who are and/or think they are good at drawing logicial inferences a la (E) but don't have as much personal experience fo the pitfalls described in (F) are likely to resent the social taboo described in (F) because it seems fussy and nonsensical to them. I am somewhat prone to this error (not so much with race, but with other things)

(H) The word "racist" is horrendously undefined. It is used both to mean "someone or something which treats people differently based on 'race', rightly or wrongly" (including examples where treating people differently is the only possible thing to do, such as preventative advice for medical conditions, or advice on how to avoid bad racism from other people) and to mean "someone or something which is morally wrong to discriminate based on race." Thus a description of whether something is "racist" is typically counterproductive.

I admit I only skimmed the OP's transcript, but my impression is that he fairly describes why he is frustrated that it is difficult to talk about these issues, but I am extremely leery of a lot of the examples he uses.

I was going to write more, but am not sure how to push it. How am I doing so far...? :)

Replies from: JoachimSchipper, JackV, Eugine_Nier, thomblake, Multiheaded
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T15:58:27.331Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think your summary is fine, but I'd add this: almost everyone who thinks in terms of "differences between races" massively overestimates the effect of race (alone, social class does matter a lot), to the point that pretending there is no difference is probably a better idea. (Similar to how it's better to not designate a 'current best candidate', if you're human.)

Replies from: JackV
comment by JackV · 2012-05-11T16:10:39.586Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yes, I'd agree. (I meant to include that in (B)). I mean, in fact, I'd say that "there are no biological differences between races other than appearance" is basically accurate, apart from a few medical things, without any need for tiptoeing around human biases. Even if the differences were a bit larger (as with gender, or even larger than that), I agree with your last parenthesis that it would probably still be a good idea to (usually) _act_as if there weren't any.

comment by JackV · 2012-05-11T15:36:02.034Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

From context, it seems "race realism" refers to the idea that there are legitimate differences between races, is that correct? However, I'm not sure if it's supposed to refer to biological differences specifically, or any cultural differences? And it seems to be heavily loaded with connotations which I'm unaware of, that I would be hesitant to say it was "true" or "not true" even if I knew the answer to the questions in the two first sentences.

comment by Eugine_Nier · 2012-05-12T20:54:59.130Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Given the existence of taboo (C) how can you possibly have enough evidence to be as sure of (B) as you are?

comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T15:36:54.752Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Seems like a pretty good summary. With more detail and possibly some experimental results there might be a good Less Wrong post in there - about the dangers of thinking about race if you're a human.

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-12T11:14:47.984Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Because of this, there is (rightly IMHO) a social taboo against doing (E) even when it might make sense.

Yep, I also think that the mainstream position on this is largely better than the more naive approach, whether you call it "race realism" or something else. It relies on denial, doublethink and hypocrisy, but none of these are really horrible in themselves - not compared to the things once done under the banner of "racial realism" (slavery, genocide, mistreatment, etc). Now, I understand the HBD advocates' frustration; it might indeed be possible to build a better-working and more honest system - but I fear that most of them don't even understand how much caution they need to exercise!

However, I upvoted the transcript of Aurini's talk the moment I read it, as this is unusually good for that contrarian crowd; he displays some much-needed sympathy, courtesy and sorrow at the whole human tragedy.

Replies from: Eugine_Nier, Strange7
comment by Eugine_Nier · 2012-05-12T21:03:12.968Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It relies on denial, doublethink and hypocrisy, but none of these are really horrible in themselves

The problem with "denial, doublethink and hypocrisy" is that once you commit to them all truth is ever after your enemy.

Frankly, this is the same argument theists use when they say that without God morality can't exist.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-13T09:36:24.121Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That's rash. The human world cannot be so black and white, divided neatly into righteous truths and evil lies.

Replies from: Eugine_Nier, TheOtherDave
comment by Eugine_Nier · 2012-05-13T18:18:16.199Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

True, nevertheless in this case you still have a problem. In order to maintain the lie that race realism is false, (I don't know to what extent it's actually true but the point is that you don't either) you at the least have to explain away the disproportionate contribution of certain races to crime and the disproportionate presence of other races in technical fields.

The first requires either a never-ending-quest to find ever subtler forms of racism on the part of police and victims to explain this away as a product of a biased justice system, or finding ever subtler forms of racism on the part of society that is the "root cause" of these crimes. Alternatively, this requires you to lie about the crime statistics or not report them by race which makes it impossible to do accurate criminology (since at least all other studies will have a confounding variable that can't be controlled for without raising awkward questions).

The second requires a similar never-ending-quest to find ever subtler forms of racism on the part academics that effect their hiring decisions, and ever subtler forms of racism on the part of educators that cause them to assign certain groups lower grades. Alternatively, insist that grades and hiring be normalized by race, and hope no one notices that members of certain races are incompetent compared to their peers or asks awkward questions about why this renormalization is necessary.

In fact, all of the above and more has been happening over the last 40 years.

And this is all before you start studying human genetics.

Replies from: whowhowho
comment by whowhowho · 2013-01-28T18:17:00.249Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

you at the least have to explain away the disproportionate contribution of certain races to crime

Race correlates with poverty correlates with crime. Next.

comment by TheOtherDave · 2012-05-13T18:23:31.885Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I imagine that depends a lot on to what extent one values truth, given that whatever X I value divides the world into righteous Xes and evil non-Xes. But I would agree that it's really unlikely that any humans value truth to the exclusion of everything else, though I've met some who claim to.

comment by Strange7 · 2012-06-20T09:32:42.706Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Is the same level of caution necessary now that those historical atrocities are available as well-documented examples, and now that a wide range of ethnicities have political organizations willing and able to pursue their interests, as would have been necessary to prevent such things from happening in the first place?

comment by kilobug · 2012-05-11T11:22:22.389Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Not really on-topic, but I am the only one who find video a very bad support for rational thinking ? You can't first give a quick glance to the content first, you can't read it carefully at your own pace, or re-read certain parts when needed, or make a pause to ponder or check a fact or an argument, or make a criticism by quoting parts and writing your opinion on the part, ...

All that in addition to technical issues : video require much more bandwidth, a working sound system (right now I'm during lunch break at work, I've no sound, but I can read text), is much harder to understand for non-native speakers, and is much less accessible to people with disabilities.

I don't get this fashion of doing everything through videos... am I the only one to feel that way ?

Replies from: Emile, Emile, khafra, army1987, johnlawrenceaspden, thomblake, Aurini
comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T12:34:29.220Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I don't get this fashion of doing everything through videos... am I the only one to feel that way ?

Definitely not; watching a video requires that I put my headphones off or be somewhere where I can blast sound without disturbing anybody nearby; also the user interface is awkward, I have to click to stop listening, etc. I probably skip 90% of links to videos, and am much more likely to follow links to written material or images.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:10:40.966Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I deeply apologize for tricking you into watching a video with my link to a youtube video.

Replies from: Emile
comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T13:26:11.971Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I was just giving an extra data point for kilobug's remark; going off the number of upvotes I think there's a significant chunk of people who prefer video to text.

(and sheesh, if you want to talk about politically incorrect topics you're going to be a bit more thick-skinned, here you're snapping back at a preference of media as if it was a criticism)

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:32:44.795Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I've been gang-banged on LW for being politically incorrect before (ironically on a thread about politically incorrect ideas...); I deserve your sheesh.

And now that I actually read through your comment... yeah, it did the same to me. ctrl+click new window, but I suppose that's too late.

Sorry. :S I meant for the video to be embedded.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:37:57.426Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Again, chill out. Nobody here engages in nonconsensual gay sex with anyone. ;)

comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T13:28:50.143Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Straw poll, because the absolute number of upvotes and answers to kilobug doesn't give us much info on who prefers text to video.

So, what do you prefer, text or video?

Replies from: Emile, David_Gerard, Aurini, army1987, Emile, Emile
comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T13:29:32.710Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Upvote this comment if you prefer reading essays/blog posts/articles to watching a video of someone talking.

comment by David_Gerard · 2012-05-11T16:12:00.808Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

In almost all cases, text. The exceptions are rare - Feynman is just AMAZING on video, much better than the same material as text.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:41:40.252Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Is there an upvote for "written and video forms are different"?

I do both, you know; but with something as ballsy as admitting race realism, I wanted to do it face first and in speech. Technichally I broke the law in Canada by posting this video; I at least want my face showing while I do it.

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T13:43:19.123Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

So, what do you prefer, text or video?

It depends.

comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T13:29:53.889Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Upvote this comment if you prefer watching a video of someone talking to reading an essays/blog post/articles .

comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T13:30:01.475Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(karma balance)

comment by khafra · 2012-05-11T12:33:21.798Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Agreed. I didn't even listen to the Judea Pearl interview that just got posted, and I know that one's good. Video should be reserved for something you can't do with text, or with text and pictures.

Replies from: Aurini, Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:13:17.698Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Or, alternatively - don't watch the fucking thing if you don't like videos.

The world is not built for you; some people like videos. That's why I write, and videologue.

www.staresattheworld.com

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:11:44.165Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yup, I agree; somebody that put's their face and voice onto their opinions is clearly a faggot.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:20:30.636Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ok now I think you might be trolling or trying to be cool and ironic. I don't like either.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T15:31:50.577Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

But can't one do all three?

Sometimes the truth can only be spoken through ugliness and riddles. I am Tyrion Lannister. You're breaking my heart, GLaDOS. At best, I hoped to find Bronn in this LW company of rascals - and then I saw Shae. Beautiful, woundrous, Shae; her mere being an argument to right myself, to be a better man... and now Shae speaks against me?

Should I apologize for the nature of my being? A man of pure fire, hate, truth, and humour? Should I wreck it all?

For you?

Would you still love me if I did all that? Would anyone love me?

Better to remain a misfit...

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T18:22:29.260Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Heh. That was actually amusing. I'm a sucker for A Song of Ice and Fire reference. (^_^)

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T11:36:14.664Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Agreed. I enjoy videos, but sometimes I'd prefer to read an abstract or something first to decide whether it's worth spending 20 minutes on. (Ideally, a transcript would be useful too, though I recognize it's much more work for the author.)

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:06:33.631Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I apologize profusely for not going through the effort of writing an entire transcript for you.

Replies from: EStokes, Eugine_Nier, army1987
comment by EStokes · 2012-05-11T13:40:20.539Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

To avoid repeating myself I will just say here that I've downvoted multiple replies of yours for hostility. Stating a preference for text isn't an attack on you; misrepresenting people's responses just comes off badly.

comment by Eugine_Nier · 2012-05-12T05:33:12.682Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Consider how long it would take you to write a transcript. Then consider how long it would take people to watch the video, multiplied by the number of people on LW interested in the topic. Compare the results.

Replies from: gwern
comment by gwern · 2012-05-12T16:32:44.943Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(And let's not forget the deaf or hard of hearing.)

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T13:22:03.646Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I didn't expect you to, so no apologies are needed. (That was the point of the word ideally and the part after the last comma in my post.)

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:29:15.604Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ah, so that 200 word abstract wasn't abstract enough for you?

I bust my ass to make videos that are both entertaining and informative, but -- the one time I post a relevant video to LW, it's not acceptable because I didn't provie army1987 (who, btw, never served) a bloody transcript?

You are more entitled than Paris Hilton.

Replies from: army1987
comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T13:39:28.701Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

What abstract? And when did I say it was not “acceptable” to not provide a transcript?

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:13:10.363Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

30 minutes after posting I rewrote it to provide an abstract; you may not have seen that.

comment by johnlawrenceaspden · 2012-08-28T11:12:20.624Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

No. I loathe them and never even follow the links. ( And I greatly prefer face to face to telephone to e-mail ) Arguments made by video are forever lost to me.

comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T14:58:50.022Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I agree. Video is annoying. In addition to what you said, it's harder to grep through and to do programmatic analysis and manipulation.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T11:31:58.715Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Video and audio (AM radio) are a very difficult forms of rhetoric; done right, it's information and entertainment. Done wrong...

Aren't you glad that I started out with EY?

comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-11T14:45:52.746Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

There doesn't seem to be much content here that hasn't already been said in a more informative, more detailed and more careful and nuanced fashion by Razib Khan. Discussing these issues without being mind-killed is very difficult, and it is even more difficult when the person who starts a post off responds in a hostile fashion to even mild criticisms about the medium of their comments.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:37:48.888Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I recommend Gergory Cochran's and Henry Harpending's blog too.

Replies from: JoachimSchipper
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T16:02:47.278Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(Is there a reason for this to be downvoted?)

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T16:31:10.675Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I'm pretty sure LWers don't mind links to the West Hunter blog since those seem to be well liked. And Gregory Cochran's and Henry Harpending's most recent book was reviewed on LessWrong too, the authors even did a Q&A with us! Their blog deals with the same topics as GNXP (heck they used to contribute to GNXP!) so it is a topical link too (Razib links to them as well and did a blogging head episode with Greg).

I'm not sure, but considering my krama has dropped quite a bit and I since I can't find a virulently disliked post recently I guess someone went through most of my comment history and down voted it. (;_;)

Replies from: JoachimSchipper
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-12T09:44:54.132Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(For what it's worth, someone did go through the last pages of my comment history and downvoted everything.)

comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T13:56:00.713Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(Based on metatroll's transcript (thanks!).)

[EDIT: expanded, original below.]

Unfortunately, you seem to fall prey to the usual errors:

  • you do not mention high-education-results subcultures. Analyzing educational results leads to the non-mainstream and actionable-to-you result "tiger moms are awesome" (one prominent LWian does think in that direction). However, when race realists do this analysis, they always conclude (only) "blacks suck". (To be explicit: you've been hanging with white supremacists.)
  • parents' social standing is highly influential. Serious civil rights legislation has only been in place for fifty years or so; there are huge confounding factors when inferring "inherent" intelligence from current life outcomes, which should at least be mentioned.
  • name-calling is not an argument.
  • you rail against feminism, but that seems somewhat unrelated. More importantly, women do pretty well in society (in particular, in the educational outcomes you cited above), so a straight "black people are poor - women are poor, too" analogy seems to fall flat. (This also furthers the impression that you've been hanging with a particular kind of white dude.)
  • "affirmative action discriminates against whites" is not a fair and full evaluation of that policy, since that is indeed exactly what it's supposed to do. Your "awesome black doctor" is an argument against affirmative action, but you have not really engaged the core goal (improve chances for black people).

[Pre-EDIT: was: Unfortunately, you seem to fall prey to the usual errors: not mentioning Asian-American or other high-education-results cultures; not mentioning history; name-calling; linking it to unrelated causes including "men's rights"; attacking affirmative action without even considering whether the good outweighs the bad.]

Replies from: GLaDOS, None, CharlieSheen, CharlieSheen, Aurini
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:23:42.365Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Asian-American or other high-education-results cultures

I'm not quite sure what you mean here. Asian Americans have lower crime rates than white Americans. And East Asians consistently outscore whites on IQ tests and academic achievement in general.

But we have no evidence at all this is due to high-education culture. East Asians in the US do outperform their IQ scores when it comes to academic performance and income so the effect probably is there.

not mentioning history

The entire planet knows "the history" at this point merely from exposure to US pop culture.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T16:13:34.006Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Meh. This post is very unimpressive yet high in karma. And all critical responses to it the good ones and the bad ones are insta down voted. I'm washing my hands of this mess. If the situation changes I'll edit in a proper response.

Replies from: JoachimSchipper, CuSithBell
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T16:46:17.132Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Consider this a request for a proper response; those are standard objections, after all.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T16:50:31.956Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ok I'll do a proper response later, I hope I didn't offend you or come of as if acting in bad faith, I was just annoyed at how horribly badly this entire comment section seems to be going.

comment by CuSithBell · 2012-05-11T16:54:12.426Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Huh? I only see one downvoted descendant, and it's Aurini's, and recently edited.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T16:58:43.035Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

After my comment and that of JoachimSchipper the situation much improved. It was (is?) a bit hectic and hot-blooded, besides arguments as soldiers and knee jerk down voting apparently even karmassasiantions where going on. I've since also retracted the comment.

Replies from: CuSithBell
comment by CuSithBell · 2012-05-11T17:00:15.145Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ah, I see. Thanks for the clarification!

comment by CharlieSheen · 2012-05-11T16:12:16.943Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Not having the willpower to properly respond in this trainwreck of a thread, I'm just going to link to a related post I previously made on the gap (considering the knee jerk down voting all responses to your contrary responses to your post are getting I wonder how long my comment stay at +19).

Replies from: CuSithBell
comment by CuSithBell · 2012-05-11T16:56:54.479Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I see one downvoted response by Aurini (recently edited), one slightly upvoted response from GLaDOS, one slightly upvoted post by you (that is explicitly "not an appropriate post"), and two posts talking about a pattern of kneejerk downvoting. What's going on?

comment by CharlieSheen · 2012-05-11T16:04:48.509Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Nah.

I seldom see so much reasonable sounding silliness. I don't have the time to make an appropriate post.

Adoption studies dude. Also once you control tiger moms for the heritable traits they give to their kids you get a big fat zilch in the long term (short term effects can be strong but they wear off).

EY talks about "work ethic" in HPMOR to explain Askenazi success, I'm sure it helps, but Jewish sucess is eight tenths their high IQ. And I'm pretty sure that is genetic in origin.

Replies from: Alicorn, JoachimSchipper
comment by Alicorn · 2012-05-11T17:07:47.522Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

EY talks about "work ethic" in HPMOR to explain Askenazi success

...

Padma Patil (whose parents came from a non-English-speaking culture and thus had raised her with an actual work ethic), Anthony Goldstein (out of a certain tiny ethnic group that won 25% of the Nobel Prizes)

Padma Patil is not Ashkenazi, she's Indian. The passage explains Anthony Goldstein's success via ethnicity simpliciter, but Padma Patil's via her parents' cultural parenting style.

Replies from: CharlieSheen
comment by CharlieSheen · 2012-05-11T17:41:38.329Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Sorry I was speaking from memory. Retracted.

I explicitly recalled him talking about an "actual work ethic" as a positive trait of a culture as an explanation for success and I recalled him making a throwaway line about Goldstein's ethnicity. I morphed them into one.

Bad brain, terrible brain! Trust your recollections less! Or maybe I should just reread HPMOR after all this time, I'm guessing new chapters have been released in 2012 :D

comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T16:22:51.876Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Note that I'm attacking Aurini's argument, which was based on straight educational outcomes. I do appreciate the additional information; I'm neither American nor a social scientist, so my knowledge is ultimately limited.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:36:11.521Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

EDIT: In case you didn't notice, I'm not arguing for race realism - my introductory remarks state that I don't get it. However, I'm arguing against the egalitarian premise. You attack the premises I supposedly hold - what's your explanation of 2.2 billion dollars failing to achieve anything?

I cite and link that fact - and reference the Colour of Crime study, which I do not link, but is easably searchable.

Can you explain either of these? Or... is it just racism that's behind it all?

My theory fits the facts. Your theory is comfortable, and fits the political will.

Edited.

Replies from: JoachimSchipper, Multiheaded
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T15:41:51.754Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(I've expanded my comment to hopefully make it more clear what I mean.)

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T15:47:45.562Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

...gobbledly gook...

...gook...

See? You are racist against Asians, you just don't know it yet! (I'm not, I merely pointed out the racist reference.)

:trollface:

comment by gjm · 2012-05-13T21:21:16.999Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

OK, I read the transcript. Conclusion: Whether or not "race realism" is racist (my opinion, FWIW: no, it needn't be, and some version of it might well be right), Aurini sounds very racist indeed; and since Aurini is an LW regular doing his best to present "race realism" impartially for an LWish audience, my estimate of the credibility of "race realism" just went down.

Of course "X sounds racist" isn't much of an argument. Allow me to pick out a few things that seem to me to point that way. (Generally because they seem to me unreasonable in ways best explained by underlying racist attitude.) Quotes like this "..." are actual quotations from Aurini; ones like this '...' are quotations from others; ones like this <<...>> are paraphrases.

(1) Going straight from <> to "it does make sense to avoid events where there's going to be a predominantly black population attending, just for your own safety". (No, not without much finer-grained information about that difference in crime rates, it doesn't.) Also, btw, "The Color of Crime" is not "done by the FBI"; it's put out by an organization called the New Century Foundation. Readers may consult Google and make up their own minds about the impartiality and trustworthiness of that organization; I'll say only that learning that Aurini's numbers came from them greatly reduced my confidence in their correctness and relevance (though I believe it's a very robust finding that in the US black people commit a lot more violent crime than white people).

(2) That 2.1 million dollars thing: there's something super-fishy about this. Suppose you have two groups of people and you spent a lot of money trying to improve one group's educational outcomes. This might work or it might not, but why would you expect whether there's a genetic difference in their intelligence to have much to do with whether it works? Unless the less successful group are, literally, completely ineducable, it seems like pouring money into helping them do better ought to do something either way. So if there's a big effort and no effect, for sure it's interesting, but on the face of it it says nothing about the origins of whatever differences there were. (Also: On looking up the Cato Institute page, the figures seem very different from $2.1 million (perhaps it was $2.1 billion?) -- which is just as well, because $2M over 12 years isn't actually all that much -- and it seems like the city's black students were not actually terribly well served by the initiative: 'the district had discovered that it was easier to meet the court's 60/40 integration ratio by letting black students drop out'; 'Although the plan was ostensibly designed to benefit black inner-city students, in practice it required spending hundreds of mlilions [...] while neglecting the needs of inner-city blacks for health care, counseling, and basic instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic.' So this really doesn't seem like good evidence about "race realism" or "human biodiversity". And as for the description of it as "a social experiment that should never have been performed in the first place" -- why not? Because everyone should have known it's a waste of money to spend money trying to help black people because they're Inferior, or what?

(3) "And so if blacks are underachieving [...] and if they are more likely to go to prison [...] we need to actually to come up with a theory of mind, a theory of evolution that explains these differences between the races." That's quite a leap you've made there.

(4) "so long as these popular grievers are out there, messing with government and stealing public money" -- stealing? Srsly?

(5) "the attack on white culture, the attack on civilized culture".

(6) "And most whites have experienced something where they were subtly threatened or just plain insulted by a group of blacks. And so this does arouse the passions, and in some cases it goes so far as hatred." -- Guess what? Most black people have been "subtly threatened or just plain insulted" by white people, too. It takes quite a remarkable level of obliviousness to play the Poor Beleaguered Threatened White People card here.

(7) "imagine you're a black doctor. [...] if I see that you have black skin, I am going to assume on default that you got the job through affirmative action, that you're nothing but a token" -- if you are really going to assume that, just because you see someone with black skin, then I am sorry but you are a total idiot and you don't get to blame the regrettable consequences on anything but your own idiocy and that of others similarly afflicted.

So, even without the extraordinary viciousness of Aurini's responses to the mildest criticisms (and in some cases to actually being agreed with) in comments here, my personal estimate of Pr(Aurini's views on race are at least partly the result of racism) is quite high.

comment by NelsonLinehan · 2012-05-11T11:16:49.029Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Human Biodiversity Theorem" has no Google hits and sounds crackpotty.

Replies from: Richard_Kennaway, None
comment by Richard_Kennaway · 2012-05-11T11:52:33.587Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Race Realism" sounds just as crackpotty. Putting "not only do I say this, but in addition, I'm right!" into the name of one's hobbyhorse is a bad sign.

Replies from: thomblake, Oligopsony
comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T14:55:25.488Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I agree with Oligopsony on this one. I'm surprised you don't just read "Race Realism" as "The position that race is a real thing", akin to "Moral Realism".

Replies from: Alicorn
comment by Alicorn · 2012-05-11T17:13:55.807Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This is how I automatically read it too.

comment by Oligopsony · 2012-05-11T14:21:14.725Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

To be fair, my understanding of the term is that it's meant to mean "realism about the existence of races" rather than "realistic views on race;" compare moral, modal, scientific, speculative, Platonic &c. realisms. (And ignore the aesthetic and IR uses of the word, I guess.) So read charitably it's not the equivalent of Scientology, Factology, &c., at least in that particular sense.

I do get crackpot vibes from that cluster of peoplespace for other reasons, but I discount such vibes significantly due to tribal loyalties at play, and I suspect most other people who aren't in it should as well.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:29:24.028Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I do get crackpot vibes from that cluster of peoplespace for other reasons, but I discount such vibes significantly due to tribal loyalties at play, and I suspect most other people who aren't in it should as well.

Ah the tragedy of lousy contrarian clusters.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T11:26:16.766Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It is usually called Human Biodiversity or HBD.

comment by katydee · 2012-05-11T10:21:58.135Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Links without commentary aren't suited for the main area and should be put in the Discussion section.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T10:28:39.266Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This is a 20 minute video which I put quite a bit of effor into; I intended to embed it, but was not able to.

If it was a 20 minute video about bayesian theory, would you also have made the above comment?

This is rationalist related; this is a formal presentation; that is why I posted it.

Replies from: katydee, GLaDOS, Richard_Kennaway
comment by katydee · 2012-05-11T11:09:16.315Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yes. I'm not going to watch a 20 minute video about anything unless it is highly regarded or I think there are compelling reasons for me to watch it, since I can read the transcript of a 20 minute video in 1-2 minutes and most people are incompetent at leveraging the strengths of video to make watching a video more worthwhile than reading text.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T11:16:16.961Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Then send GLaDOS $5 and have her transcript it.

Have you done transcription? it's a pain in the ass. Put this video on while you make breakfast, if you want, or don't watch or read it at all. I put it here because I thought you'd find it interesting; if listening to a video while you cook food is too much for you, please don't trouble yourself for my sake.

Replies from: Kaj_Sotala, katydee
comment by Kaj_Sotala · 2012-05-11T11:42:33.245Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Downvoted for using a hostile tone to reply to honest and reasonable feedback.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T12:01:22.770Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Downvoted for calling a hostile response to a hostile response hostile.

Replies from: Kaj_Sotala, GLaDOS, katydee, Multiheaded, army1987
comment by Kaj_Sotala · 2012-05-11T12:58:48.959Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Being blunt is not the same thing as being hostile, especially not if it's in response to a question.

You asked whether a description would be enough to make the post valuable to people on this site. katydee thought that it would not make it reasonable for him, and explained why. You are of course under no obligation to cater to his wishes in particular if you deem them unreasonable, just like he is under no obligation to check out your video if he doesn't consider it a worthwhile use of his time. But although he could have been a little less blunt, he never attacked you directly and merely explained his own feelings on the subject.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:16:28.552Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

So my video is a waste of his time because it lacks description (which I added when somebody who was polite pointed out my error), but it is worth three comments decrying it, without an actual viewing?

Please; I was not the asshole in that situation.

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T13:59:33.643Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Don't take those kids of statements on LessWrong personally. Discourse on LessWrong can be blunt, but people generally are honest and don't play that many games. I find the trade off worth it.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:05:04.764Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

GLaDOS, I just outed myself as an evil racist; LW's hate is a warm glow. :)

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T14:30:26.055Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Check out my comment history I'm an evil "racist" too. I don't get down voted though.

Oh I'm sure the downvotes for the main articles are almost entirely from newbs to the topic who are shocked SHOCKED to see this argument. And people who are thinking "this is true but I can't have this on LW main it looks bad to non-LWers!". And now that its in negative numbers people will dog pile on it (happens to most)... and that isn't so much your fault (though I guarantee you you would have had a better response in discussion).

But in some of the later comments about the meta level you really did responded badly. You don't seem to be currently calibrated to what kind of style LW posters want. Don't worry it gets back to you after a while. (^_^)

Replies from: TheOtherDave, Aurini
comment by TheOtherDave · 2012-05-11T15:01:51.941Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You don't seem to be currently calibrated to what kind of style LW posters want. Don't worry it gets back to you after a while.

You seem to believe that aurini wants to have their comments upvoted, and is simply failing to implement that desire successfully. Have I correctly understood you?

If so, I'm curious as to what makes you conclude that. It seems unlikely to me.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:06:13.129Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Past behaviour is a excellent predictor of future behaviour. He used to be a good faith participant (check out his early comment history) on LessWrong and has obviously read at least some of the sequences and occasionally cite them outside of LW.

LessWronger posting norms and style are really different from some flame heavy parts of the internet. It can be hard to adjust.

Replies from: TheOtherDave
comment by TheOtherDave · 2012-05-11T15:11:16.848Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Mm. Fair enough... thanks for the explanation.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T16:41:15.342Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

He has apologized, I think I may have been right after all.

Replies from: TheOtherDave
comment by TheOtherDave · 2012-05-11T17:37:24.455Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(nods) The comment you link to decreases my confidence that aurini was intentionally setting out to violate community norms (though not below 50%).

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:53:58.613Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

GLaDOS, you are the first girl-computer to give me a bRoner.

The mind truly is the sexy organ, even for a playa like myself.

I may have to trust you to post the videos full of Truth in the future; I have three more posts, tops, before I burn out of karma. You must post them, while decrying me as a monster! That is how the fates say it must be.

Replies from: JoshuaZ, GLaDOS
comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-11T15:03:38.003Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

GLaDOS, you are the first girl-computer to give me a bRoner.

The mind truly is the sexy organ, even for a playa like myself.

This sort of comment reinforces negative stereotypes pretty badly. There's a perception that people who self-identify as "race realists" are often simply smart versions of "bros" and have generally sexist attitudes. How much of that is due to halo effects and tribal allegiance issues isn't clear. But this sort of comment really doesn't help matters.

I may have to trust you to post the videos full of Truth

Capitalizing truth is never a good sign. If you feel a need to do it, it may be a good moment to step back from the keyboard and think carefully about what you believe, why you believe it, and how to most effectively communicate those reasons to people who may not agree.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T15:19:37.581Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Remind me, JoshuaZ - who is the Pretntious Writer who captilizes Truth and Many Other Words, and has subcribers... and who is the pretentious prick who comments upon standards of writing behaviour?

You can burn in hell; GLaDOS is a bloody lady, and sexy as the day is long. She has class and internet bearing - something you clearly lack. I also suspect that you do not own a motorcycle. If you did, you'd be giving me an internet high-five, bro, and we'd be rocking out on skype, like True Men. Instead you argue with me about something that has no bearing to the topic at hand.

I detect someone who seeks reputation points.

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:02:56.865Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

GLaDOS, you are the first girl-computer to give me a bRoner.

This is cool because this started out as my RP account, but if I was posting this under my real name or different nick comments like that would be creepy.

Note not everyone may get the reference so I suggest you stop. (~_^)

comment by katydee · 2012-05-11T15:34:01.589Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I feel I was no more hostile than-- to use your argument-- someone judging a competent black doctor as incompetent thanks to their priors about affirmative action.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T15:36:44.456Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That's rassist!

Also, far less rational than you ought to pride yourself on being; but I didn't expect rationality from LessWrong, so I'm not disappointed!

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T12:22:00.770Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That's not how you reacted during our unfortunate altercation on gender relations ethics!

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T12:56:47.857Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

And who are you again?

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:00:56.305Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Um, at the risk of re-igniting passions... you replied to a link I posted, which started a rather heated argument that attracted other commenters. (Unless you remember and your question was meant as an insult.)

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-12T09:51:27.125Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

A hostile response to a hostile response is hostile.

comment by katydee · 2012-05-11T11:30:55.904Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

My point is simply that, were you to provide an expanded description that might provide compelling reasons to watch your video, I would be more inclined to look into it-- but a link submitted without context is extremely unlikely to get my attention.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T12:02:11.821Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

GLaDOS said the same, but politely. I expanded the description.

You could have been nicer.

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T10:36:22.177Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Hey I can do a quick cleaned up transcript and if you'd like you can put it in the OP. (^_^)

Edit: Metatroll beat me to it! Give him karma.

People here really hate just link posts and this is mostly true of any subject. This may be because they can't quickly skim them to make a rapid estimate of the value of information. But I think the really big thing is that most people just lazily assume a link is to non-original work.

Note that when people like gwern make badass research intensive posts they never just post a link to their website, they usually replicate the entire article on LW or at least quote extensively. Even in Discussion single link posts aren't much liked.

I don't really like this norm honestly, but it is an established one.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T10:49:25.989Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I appreciate the clarification. :) My bad - I'm surprised to hear that that is a problem, but that is life, eh?

I rewrote the description. What do you think? I don't want you to go to all the effort of doing a transcript; I suspect it might take longer than the video itself (with all the false starts, etc). But I will not say no to it, either. Do you think it's still necessary?

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T11:01:33.532Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I rewrote the description. What do you think?

Much better, it is a good summary. Perhaps drop the Obama reference (keep the discussion on race line). For some strange reason any name-drop of an American politician in a post seems to cost it 5 or 10 karma instantly (politics is the mindkiller has become a mindkiller heh (^_^) )

I don't want you to go to all the effort of doing a transcript; I suspect it might take longer than the video itself (with all the false starts, etc). But I will not say no to it, either. Do you think it's still necessary?

Oh its ok, its not really necessary. A paragraph explaining what the key argument is and perhaps links to related posts work just fine. I was just offering to PM you a raw transcript of what your said, that I would type do as I watched. BTW So far I'm linking your video.

Have you considered making a discussion post that summarized and linked to some of your older videos? I think someone recommended a few from your channel in a discussion here once and it got up votes. The Atheistkult one might be edgy but I think it would actually go down well and would be very relevant to the LW crowd.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T11:45:26.886Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Sexy GLaDOS, I've done transcription myself, and I know that it's no fun - but a few comments suggest that a transcript would be desired.

If it's easy for you - if you think the video deserves it - then it might be much appreciated.

Replies from: metatroll
comment by metatroll · 2012-05-11T13:17:52.485Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

http://pastebin.com/J1RMZA3G

Replies from: Aurini, GLaDOS
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:45:44.225Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Greatly appreciated, friend.

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T13:52:39.321Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Darn you beat me to it. Good work!

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:17:42.417Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Ok, how do you guys do that?

comment by Richard_Kennaway · 2012-05-11T10:32:26.913Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This information should be in the original posting, together with a summary of what the video says. As it stands, it's just a YouTube link.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T10:34:13.595Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

...

Then I will add it. It's people like you who remind me of the saying that "Courtesy is the grease for the gears of society."

EDIT: Sexy Robot GLaDOS suggests that people submit unoriginal works like I did. Sorry Richard, I haven't been on here in a while. If that's what you thought, then my reply was overly harsh and I apologize for being so rude.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T10:52:29.072Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yeah the whole Discussion vs. Main norms hadn't settled down until relatively recently.

Replies from: Richard_Kennaway
comment by Richard_Kennaway · 2012-05-11T11:13:06.150Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Discussion vs. Main customs have been settled since the beginning. It takes a lot to make a mere link post suitable for Main; it has been very rare.

Replies from: thomblake, None, Aurini
comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T14:44:55.766Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Discussion vs. Main customs have been settled since the beginning.

That's very not true. I assume you mean "Since Discussion was added to the site", since there was no Discussion section on Less Wrong for quite some time. Before Discussion was around, it was considered acceptable to post relevant links as articles, and Eliezer even said so explicitly.

After Discussion was introduced, it took some time to settle whether link posts still belonged on Main. Since Discussion was generally conceived as a place for posts that are not substantial enough to be Main posts, and single-link posts were already considered acceptable for Main, it was not immediately obvious that such posts belong in Discussion.

At the least, it's absurd to think that any norms/customs regarding X have been settled since the beginning of X - it always takes some time.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T11:22:39.849Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I didn't mean to imply just link posts where common at the start or anything like that. Considering your feedback I think the norms not being quite settled at first could well just be my projection.

I have read a lot of LessWrong articles, but to be honest I had a hard time deciding where to put my "hey you! why don't you learn game theory?" post. I only settled on main after I asked a few LWers on the IRC channel about where to put it. Maybe I should have said "it can be hard to figure out the norms".

Which reminds me... @Aurini: Consider adding [Link]: or [link] or something like that before the title.

Replies from: JackV
comment by JackV · 2012-05-11T11:35:16.063Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I would say add [Video]: [Link] would perpetuate the misunderstanding that there may be no immediate content, [Video] correctly warns people who (for whatever reason) can't easily view arguments in video format.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T11:36:29.862Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Good idea.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:19:29.414Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Since the beginning"? I've been here longer than you, pal; I just don't get off on the politics, and post rarely.

Don't try and pull some contemporary social norm as Status; if I fucked up with my lack of description, tell me! I admitted my error, and corrected it; do you have a real complaint, or are you just trying to prove that your IQ is 2 inches longer than mine?

comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-13T23:38:33.118Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I've read the transcript. Some thoughts, which accidentally turned into a giant wall of text:

Just as you avoid high crime neighborhoods, it does make sense to avoid events where there's going to be a predominantly black population attending, just for your own safety.

  • This may well go without saying, but clearly one needn't feel unsafe going to, for instance, an African-American Studies department brunch, or a symposium on improving education in the inner cities, both of which will be disproportionately attended by black people.

  • Different levels of educational attainment can probably be explained by geographic or socioeconomic factors, which are a priori more likely than genetic explanations because such socioeconomic gaps knowably exist.

  • Can you cite some evidence that affirmative action is as prevalent as you claim, or that it leads to negative perception of blacks in the workplace? My impression was that there are enough highly qualified candidates for most things, and little enough difference in ability between them, that institutions can (often/usually) favor blacks without accepting underqualified people.

That we aren't allowed to have workplaces where men can fart and make off-color jokes, but that any office you go into, you will hear the women making very insulting jokes about men.

Is there any way you can provide evidence for this? It doesn't match my experience, and I'm not even sure this is the sort of thing one can easily keep track of.

Then there's the widespread attack on civilized values. And you see this throughout the media. Over the past 30 or 40 years, the TV husband keeps getting dumber and dumber, he becomes more... Homer Simpson was bad enough, now we have Peter Griffin, a complete retard. People living in the suburbs are made out to be lame and boring. Meanwhile ghetto culture is glorified. There's a consistent attack on people that obey the law. There's a consistent attack on people that contribute to society.

This is a separate claim from all your others and requires some sort of citation or supporting evidence.

  • regarding the bits about Trayvon Martin: you say that the story in the media is false, but you don't say what you believe the truth is or give any evidence that the commonly accepted story is false.

  • you don't give any stats on black-against-white hate crimes, and this is the sort of thing there's very likely hard data on. I'll look it up later, but if you have a source please cite it.

EDIT: According to wikipedia, about 13% of the US is black and about 18% of hate crime offenders are black. This doesn't say much about whether the black hate criminals are committing crimes against whites or against women/gays/hispanics/other minorities. Different rates of conviction among people of different races (it's widely believed that the US courts are biased against blacks) may also be clouding this. Given that, I'm not confident that the difference is statistically significant, especially if one were to control for poverty. I couldn't find much about black against white hate crime specifically, because google mostly gave me results from weird fringe groups. Overall I see weak evidence at best for the OP's assertion.

Just because I think that most women are bad at math

The commonly accepted view is that women and men are equally good at math on average, but the best men are better than the best women because there's more spread. "Most women are bad at math" is an exaggerated stereotype.

Replies from: Eugine_Nier, thomblake, JoshuaZ, albeola
comment by Eugine_Nier · 2012-05-14T04:30:34.963Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

regarding the bits about Trayvon Martin: you say that the story in the media is false, but you don't say what you believe the truth is or give any evidence that the commonly accepted story is false.

Even the media now, grudgingly, admit that their initial reporting was false or heavily distorted (and somehow all the errors went the same way). NBC has even fired three reporters over the most egregious example of this. Unfortunately, since the corrections weren't as prominent as the initial headlines, there are a lot of people who still believe some version of the distorted initial account.

Replies from: RomeoStevens, Normal_Anomaly
comment by RomeoStevens · 2012-05-14T08:37:37.849Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(and somehow all the errors went the same way)

The media always has a strong incentive to generate a narrative out of the collection of facts they obtain. Certain narratives are more popular than others. This makes the news a terrible indicator of what is going on unless they directly report statistics, which they also usually fuck up. Paying attention to the news seems to be of negative utility.

http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2011/03/the_case_agains_6.html

comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-14T17:22:58.283Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Thanks for the heads-up! I stopped paying attention to the story after about 48 hours.

comment by thomblake · 2012-05-15T18:35:28.351Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Most women are bad at math" is an exaggerated stereotype.

It's not all that surprising though, for those reasons. Lots of folks will happily say "most people are stupid". The stereotype is explainable simply by setting the bar high enough. Though by itself, that will also yield "Most men are bad at math" - several varieties of selective perception might explain this, but I most prefer xkcd's.

Replies from: Normal_Anomaly
comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-15T19:01:39.429Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

xkcd's is a good explanation. Also, the longer tail means that in the bubble of elite math departments, experience will seem to indicate that men are better on average. Of course, just because a stereotype's existence is unsurprising doesn't mean it's not exaggerated or that it's rational to believe.

comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-13T23:41:35.857Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

but the best men are better than the best women because there's more spread

Er, this is probably wrong. If one thinks that the spread will have an effect, one won't have the best men be better than the best women, one will just have a thicker tail for men than for women.

Replies from: Normal_Anomaly
comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-14T00:01:00.851Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

A thicker tail means, in a finite population, a longer (visible) tail. Consider a world with 100 men and 100 women. Suppose IQ is a normal distribution, the women have standard deviation 10 IQ points, and the men have standard deviation 15 IQ points. Since about 1% of any population will be 3 standard deviations above the mean, you expect the smartest woman to have IQ 130 and the smartest man to have IQ 145.

Replies from: JoshuaZ
comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-14T01:56:22.034Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Good point. The finite nature of the populations means that the expectation is that the thicker tail will correspond to a larger observed maximum. So my statement was wrong.

Replies from: Normal_Anomaly
comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-15T00:34:09.613Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Thanks for making me think it out well enough to explain.

comment by albeola · 2012-05-15T20:11:47.938Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

The commonly accepted view is that women and men are equally good at math on average

Some googling informs me that there's a gender gap on the math SAT and other standardized tests. It may be that you have in mind some way in which these tests don't reflect a real gap in average math ability, but I think it's more likely that you confused the data on math ability and the data on IQ. A .3 standard deviation gap would mean 62% of women are below the male average. I agree that this makes "most women are bad at math" an exaggeration, though more male spread means the numbers look worse the higher you set the bar.

Replies from: JoshuaZ
comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-15T20:21:33.218Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

The math gap is much larger in the United States than it is in Northern Europe. In general, gender inequality and poorer math performance by females are correlated. Moreover, over time, most of the gender gap has gone down. Most relevant study (although I do remember having reservations about some aspects of their methodology the last time I looked at that in detail, and I don't unfortunately remember what they were.)

comment by knb · 2012-05-13T06:08:51.685Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I would encourage you not to delete this post. This definitely is not a topic that should be posted on LW, but now that it is, you should just leave it. It will eventually get buried by other posts, and the fact that it was downvoted should be a good example "pour l'encouragement des autres".

I think the best reason to lock out hot-button topics like this, is not because they mind-kill LWers per se (with some exceptions, the debate here has been vastly better than it would be in most forums), but because it attracts people who want to talk about politics, and they ruin everything. Part of the reason the quality of discussion here is so good, is that LW is full of obscure topics, like Newcomb's problem and efficient charity, and people who care about those things tend to be cautious, quiet thinkers. Less Wrongers can actually have a pretty good debate about these things, but it might attract a different, more political element to our walled garden.

Replies from: Oscar_Cunningham
comment by Oscar_Cunningham · 2012-05-13T10:10:58.406Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Maybe

BTW, I've acted like a jerk. This will be deleted in 48 hours.

refers only to itself. i.e. Aurini intends to leave the post intact but remove the notice of apology since it distracts from the content of the post.

Replies from: Icehawk78
comment by Icehawk78 · 2012-05-16T15:34:04.615Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This would be close to ideal, regardless of whether it was the intended meaning or not. (I'd prefer simply removing the "This will be deleted" aspect, unless after calming down he no longer feels apologetic.)

comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-11T13:58:19.960Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Thank you for bringing this topic up again! I believe that LW is capable of discussing politically incorrect issues without mindkilling, and I'd like to test that belief. I'm also curious about the latest research on race and genetics for its own sake.

By the way, you mention that you're breaking the law by posting this video. Congratulations on having the guts to do it with your face showing. Can you say what the law is you're breaking? (I don't live in Canada and I'm not familiar with their free speech restrictions.)


A brief PSA: I think we should have an open, honest, rational conversation on possible genetic differences between members of different races. Right now, the OP being easily offended with regard to preferences for text versus video is threatening to sidetrack the thread and/or make it uncivil. So I'd like to ask everyone to stay on topic and stay polite.

Replies from: Raemon, Aurini
comment by Raemon · 2012-05-11T14:16:57.474Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think there exists in hypothetical-discussion-post-space a worthwhile discussion of this topic, but this post is almost certainly not it.

Replies from: Aurini, Normal_Anomaly
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:29:55.653Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I agree.

comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-12T01:27:04.271Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I agree. I was making an attempt to turn this post into it, but I didn't have much confidence it would succeed.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-12T06:29:11.053Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Same here.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:29:38.790Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You and I are in agreement, but I suspect this post will break LW; I have very little respect for the supposed 'rationality' here. I think it's on par with the rationality Galileo ran into.

The law in question is the "Human Rights Tribunal" in Canada, who recognize the right not to be offended. Look up "Ezra Levant" on youtube, to see the filthy fascists being told off by a jew for once. ;)

Replies from: Normal_Anomaly
comment by Normal_Anomaly · 2012-05-12T01:28:14.127Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think it's on par with the rationality Galileo ran into.

Downvoted for excessive exaggeration of a probably false claim (that LW is too irrational to talk about race).

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-12T06:20:39.667Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Why is this down voted? Normal_Anomaly is empirically right. For example "HBD" minus the political normative statements has been discussed reasonably as any other science.

Criticisms of political correctness that are properly packaged and backed up and get over 10 points too aren't a rare sight either. Come on Moldbug practically has a fan club among some high karma people here, PUA's and even Roissy are endorsed by a fraction too.

I think the main reason this thread went badly is as Aurini himself said in his apology is that he misbehaved in the comment section. The thing is I suspect there are LWers who probably never see either but do notice a Main article that might be mind-killed. I think we seldomly see Discussion level posts who deal with relevant unPC topics, and never main level articles.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-14T08:44:19.342Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Criticisms of political correctness that are properly packaged and backed up and get over 10 points too aren't a rare sight either. Come on Moldbug practically has a fan club among some high karma people here

I would say that Moldbug belongs more in the "Ideological dissent" and "Historical revisionism" area, not "Criticism of political correctness". He has been really quite cautious and reserved when touching race (merely observing that genetic differences probably do affect people), has posted nothing inflammatory or provocative about gender relations, has come on record as a supporter of gay rights... The only provocation (not meaning "bad and mean" - although the concrete idea here is so, to me - just "deliberately contrarian") from him in this area was his endorsement of people owning each other ("slavery", by any definition).

(Unless your definition of "Political correctness" is "Opposition to liberalism"; mine is not.)

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-14T09:07:37.400Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I don't agree on his historical revisionism, it often strikes at the very heart of this kind of sentiment, consider for example his look at decolonization. But this isn't what I was going for, as you point out Moldbug dosen't focus on politically incorrect issues, but he does utterly demolish the institutions that give moral value and legitimacy to political correctness. He delegtimizies the social construct merely by diagnosing its adaptive purpose. One dosen't need to disagree with any politically correct stance on a issue to oppose political correctness the process, much like I can think having opposable thumbs is neat yet not feel comfortable about letting natural selection shape us furtherr.

Moldbug may be wrong, but that's irrelevant for our point. Many people here think he isn't. Keeping his analysis of the modern world filed under true in one's mind and still taking political correctness as seriously as it takes itself, seems a hard thing to do. Now obviously the people who are open to agreeing with Moldbug may not be the most PC bunch to begin with, so I may be wrong in seeing some causation here, but regardless of this, the correlation is robust.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-14T09:24:38.975Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

as you point out Moldbug dosen't focus on politically incorrect issues, but he does utterly demolish the institutions that give moral value and legitimacy to political correctness

Yes. ("Yes he attacks them", not "Yes they're evil and worthless".) But certainly it's not random chance that his views on daily life might mirror the "politically correct" ones (those developed in the 20th century, that is, like tolerating non-harmful alternate lifestyles); there's likely some process - for example, Randian moral reasoning (I'm not saying he's a Randian, or that it has any merit) - that lets one arriive at some of the same views without the institutions of political correctness like the universities. Knowing his (highly rationalist/anal retentive) style of thinking, he definitely has some source of moral value and legitimacy for his opinions, less-controversial ones included. If one opposes "PC the process" without substituting anything, how does one arrive at agreeing with "PC issues"?

Now obviously Moldbug may be wrong, but many people here think he isn't.

Taboo "Moldbug" :D ; he's reasonably original as a writer, but for any one of his opinions there's a better-known individual that expressed it; he just merged them into a Grand Theory. Also, while indeed a significant proportion of LWers who talk politics might endorse the same views as him (I didn't count heads), the LWers who talk politics are an insignificant proportion of the community.

P.S. While reading, my brain autocompletes the capitalized words "Grand Theory" to "Grand Theft Auto" :(

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-14T09:30:09.787Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

The LWers who talk politics are an insignificant proportion of the community.

Yes but I wasn't saying they where a large fraction of the community. Recall what started this branch of the debate. I was implying they aren't shunned, and they get quite a bit of karma since they often do a good job of arguing about their positions. Other LessWrongers aren't short circuited by their arguments and hold them to fair rationalist standards. Which is what I would wish we could do on most mindkilling topics.

comment by David_Gerard · 2012-05-13T14:21:36.326Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This is interesting, I wonder if there's anything to it: International variation in IQ – the role of parasites . Could be as big as lead. Raise the sanity waterline: improve health!

Replies from: RomeoStevens
comment by RomeoStevens · 2012-05-14T08:40:47.447Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I wanted to thank you for pointing to this with more than an upvote. This looks very interesting.

I checked and Steve Sailer commented on the original paper, though not too substantially. Do you know of any other commentary within the HBD blogosphere on this?

Replies from: David_Gerard
comment by David_Gerard · 2012-05-14T12:04:34.031Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Human biodiversity" in this context is the latest step on the euphemism treadmill for "race realism". It's not somewhere I have any intention of spending serious thought. I posted the link because it does suggest a quite direct link between prosperity and IQ, suggesting nutrition and medicine as causes for the Flynn effect. I'll make it a discussion post so it isn't buried in this -8 post.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T10:35:08.980Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

A good video on a usually mind-killing subject.

You manage to warn about the problems of people becoming tribal about this without descending into the typical "oh noes this is too dangerous to talk about" moralizing one normally sees, since you quite correctly notice that as with any question where an individual is confident he is right and society is probably wrong, one must be on the lookout to prevent a sort of pride in having something like superior or hidden knowledge developing into an entire identity that you wear on your sleeve.

I also like you have taken some effort to explain and emphasise how approaching this from the wrong direction can be hurtful and rude. This isn't so much original content about the theory of rationality it is however I think, a good example of applied rationality. Which probably needs to be showcased more. And no I'm not talking about guides to learn how to knit or swim or draw (though I don't mind those either). I think several people have complained that we have let the politics is the mindkiller taboo strife all interesting discussion on the main section. Anyone here recall the old wild Overcoming Bias days? OB is still sort of that place, just that now its now only Robin Hanson's voice. A very interesting voice and intellectually brave one, but man talking about status all the time is boring. More posts to discussing a wide variety of real world issues, even ones where there are people who will break down, might be just what we need here. Why let contrarian blogs have all the fun?

I also think it does a good job of showcasing an example of things that society as a whole need find a way to rationally discuss or evaluate but individuals don't really benefit that much from knowing (I'm referring to the hereditarian hypothesis for the IQ gap, crime stats are probably good to know if you live in a high crime envrionment).

Because I know this is an abiding debate here on LessWrong.

You are right on this, but I'm sure there are plenty of LWers who probably fully miss this. The discussion is rather low key and only comes up when relevant. Like when someone mentions education gaps, economic development strategies or discussions of bias in academia. Human biodiversity theories are also often mentioned in "unspoked dark ideas that are probably true" threads like these ones.

Replies from: Multiheaded, Aurini
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T10:53:05.063Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It routinely also comes up as the main "unspoked dangerous idea" like in these threads.

By the way, since my foray into the cluster of those dangerous and/or heretical ideas I no longer perceive the mere theory that a person's and culture's characteristics are mostly enslaved to genes as the main bit of "forbidden knowledge" out there. Yes, it's highly distressing, yes, it could be - and often has been - abused, but it can also be handled in an universally satisfying way by a sufficiently wise thinker.

Compared to other unseen/mind-killing threats, mere racism is rather weak as the worst it has historically caused was genocide and widespread oppression compared to, say, a hypothetical permanent "corruption" and degradation of humanity, as seen in e.g. 1984 or other dystopian SF works. No, don't ask me what those (corruption and degradation) could result from; I don't even want to guess, not yet.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:24:04.605Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Obscurantism, and reference to authors who would have spit on you in real life, gives you thumbs up.

You are a pathetic intellectual coward, snidely denouncing those who go against the cultural stream, while anonymously quoting authors who had the courage to criticize the status quo.

Your contempt for me gives me an erection.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:29:37.184Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

:blink:

And I was JUST about to say that I've read the transcript of your video and found it mostly factually solid (although making some puzzling assumptions and generalizations) and refreshingly polite! Calm down, good sir. I'm not offended by this discussion and neither should you be.

I certainly never had "contempt" for you; the absolute worst thought I allowed myself was: "Shame that this charismatic man was led somewhat astray by contrarianism and unbridled resentment of modernity."

P.S. I'm quite sure that no LW commenters would be spat on by Orwell, were they so fortunate as to meet him.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:37:03.522Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

What, defend me? Well that'd be a first.

So you write a two paragraph essay talking about how idiotic I am, and then you watch the video? Spare me. You attack me repeatedly on deep comment threads, where few men tread, while openly strawmanning me on the first post, where all see.

You are the perfect illustraion of intellectual dishonesty - and the perfect avatar for the second least likely cult to form.

Prove me wrong; upvote the video that you supposedly don't hate. Or downvote it, and maintain your position of local power.

Replies from: Multiheaded, Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:40:45.135Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I already upvoted your post here when I saw it dipping below zero (check my likes, made them public). If you want it that much, I'll upvote it on youtube, too. Although I really don't like the tone and direction of comments over there; they'd rather talk about political battles than the real-world policy effects on real people.

Or downvote it, and maintain your position of local power.

WHAT local power?

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:51:53.072Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Perhaps I've misjudged you.

The battles over on my channel - if you ignore the white nationalists - are largely about survival of civilization, followed secondarily by the survival of the political state.

But overtop of those the debate is mainly whether we should have a state. I'm not even herding cats - I'm just talking to them.

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:48:44.441Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(BTW, you probably look cooler with a shiny bald skull than in a hat. No, seriously, I'm not pulling your leg! At the very least it grabs attention and makes you look like someone from WH40k.)

Replies from: thomblake, Aurini
comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T14:53:16.051Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Bald head plus saying uncomfortable things about race is probably a bad move.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:54:15.328Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That was my first impression as well, but later I changed my mind.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:54:21.880Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I needed a change of scene. Maybe I'll take my hat off every so often, I can use that to emphasize a point, right?

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:00:31.166Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Oh sure. The thing is, I've only ever watched 3 or so of your videos, and in this one you were suddenly wearing one.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:06:09.558Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Well, I'm one of the last goddamned cowboys in cowtown. Why shouldn't I wear it? The motorcycle helmet isn't photogenic.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:08:51.918Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Right, right, I'm fine with your hat! (and your other clothing, and your lineage, etc) Just sharing my relative impressions, that's all!

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:22:27.591Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think the leather jacket makes me look fat.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:28:49.793Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I'm not your spouse, dude.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:56:56.924Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You need to pick a side. Shit disturbing is only successful for so long.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T15:10:04.586Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You need to ease up.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T10:44:27.966Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

To be perfectly frank, I'm not so much a rationalist, as I am informed by rationalists.

I'm an Engineer who likes to read Physics journals.

One of EY articles I meant to directly reference, but forgot, was "keep your identity small" - don't subscribe to big movements, or label yourself as an XYZ - just be your own person. Obviously my closing remakrs were formed upon this, but I forgot to put in the quote.

Live performance is still an art I'm practicing. On the one hand I wish I had better rigour, on the other I need to be more charismatic.

Replies from: Oscar_Cunningham, None
comment by Oscar_Cunningham · 2012-05-11T11:09:42.453Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

One of EY articles I meant to directly reference, but forgot, was "keep your identity small"

It's Paul Graham actually.

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T11:14:05.626Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

An easy mistake to make since there where plenty of posts on this and related subjects, like this one by Kaj.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T13:25:28.684Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You are the soul of charity, GLaDOS.

comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T10:50:04.648Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

One of EY articles I meant to directly reference, but forgot, was "keep your identity small" - don't subscribe to big movements, or label yourself as an XYZ - just be your own person. Obviously my closing remakrs were formed upon this, but I forgot to put in the quote.

Yes the influence there was pretty obvious and I think you did a good job of applying it.

comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T13:15:54.241Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Downvoted just for associating LW with those no-I'm-not-racists. This discussion is not valuable enough to be worth it.

Replies from: drethelin, Aurini
comment by drethelin · 2012-05-11T16:50:14.030Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

downvoted for truth being less important than image.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:25:59.938Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Gold medal for being a true rationalist!

You filthy degenerate hypocrite.

Google Davis Aurini; that's me. It's fucking scary posting this sort of shit, and I'm an ex-desciple of Eliezer. I'm doing my damndest to speak the Truth, even when it's unpopular; what do you do? You down vote.

Go present an argument, you faggot.*

*I've also had more gay sex than you ever will.

Replies from: Multiheaded, JoachimSchipper
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:38:33.009Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

You filthy degenerate hypocrite.

Dude, THAT's why you're getting downvoted (I'm not doing it right now, but others do). Not because of the substance of your arguments, but because we don't address fellow members like that.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:45:12.350Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I was incredibly polite on the last debate; I still got downvoted.

Above, I see a morally righteous coward - somebody who should be an anathema to LW - and he's getting up votes. It doesn't matter what I say; I am destined to failure for not saying what I OUGHT to.

This place likes to pretend that it's counter-norm, but it parrots the university line at the drop of a hat.

Note that the argument on my video isn't the video itself - it's whether the video is appropriate or not. Perfect soviet doublespeak. 3 years ago this place would have loved challenging information.

Replies from: ArisKatsaris, thomblake
comment by ArisKatsaris · 2012-05-11T16:32:42.856Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I was incredibly polite on the last debate; I still got downvoted.

I've just glanced at your whole list of comments. Unless I missed a page or something, I'm not seeing you get significantly downvoted in any systematic way in past discussions.

Either way, whether you were treated rightly or wrongly in the past, right now you're just being absolutely horrible and trollish, and your current behaviour would easily cause you to deserve to get banned, not just downvoted.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T16:34:30.107Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I just apologized. F5 the page.

comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T15:28:49.023Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Note that the argument on my video isn't the video itself - it's whether the video is appropriate or not.

It's generally considered acceptable here to comment on style and presentation, and posters generally appreciate the feedback. It's... weird, to put it lightly, that you are responding to neutral-toned feedback with hostility.

This place likes to pretend that it's counter-norm, but it parrots the university line at the drop of a hat.

I'm not sure what you mean by "counter-norm", or why this place would like to pretend it is that.

Perfect soviet doublespeak.

I'm confused. I thought I knew what "doublespeak" was - a rhetorical technique described in 1984 wherein one simultaneously asserts a proposition and its opposite - and I don't see how the above would qualify.

Replies from: David_Gerard, Aurini
comment by David_Gerard · 2012-05-11T16:09:19.072Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It's... weird, to put it lightly, that you are responding to neutral-toned feedback with hostility.

It reminds me of years ago on Wikipedia, back when we thought neutrality meant odious people should at least be of use in defending their viewpoints, and tried to actually interact with the politer variety of neo-Nazi to see if they could actually add anything worth knowing to the articles about them. Always, about two or three responses in, they'd reliably go non-linear, in ways very like we're seeing here. This substantiates the view that "race realists" under whatever label aren't the best at working an epistemology.

it parrots the university line at the drop of a hat.

Alluding to an academic conspiracy was typical too.

Replies from: TheOtherDave
comment by TheOtherDave · 2012-05-11T16:23:33.928Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

reliably go non-linear

Thank you for this phrase.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T15:41:05.548Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Protect your ego! Insult the outsider! Even if he's been here longer than you...

Clearly he is a fascist.

Listen: are you a man with integrity or not? Address the video I posted. I rewrote the intro and others on here have a transcript. You have no excuses to continue the personal attack. Either address my argument... or make fun of me, and get rep points.

The prior will make you smarter; the latter will get you closer to getting laid.

Choose.

Replies from: thomblake
comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T15:50:45.960Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I have no interest in addressing your video. That is not my purpose here. I saw you making what looked like a mistake, and felt the need to point it out. I also pointed out confusing parts of your comment in hope that you could resolve the confusion.

I have no interest in insulting you or making fun of you, nor have I done so. I also have no interest in "getting laid", and I'd prefer you keep your opinions regarding my private life to yourself.

And nobody's been here longer than me.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T16:11:25.442Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Delete: hopefully nobody saw that.

I'm taking a 24 hour break, thom. I was over worked up, and I let it spill into this comment thread, overreacting to what people said.

I've probably acted like a jerk. not completely devoid of purpose, but a jerk nonetheless. I'd like to apologize for all of that. I had no call to be so rude to all of youl

Gah. I suppose I should repost this to the top.

Replies from: thomblake
comment by thomblake · 2012-05-11T17:53:02.115Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Not to worry, I've gone off the deep end too, memorably when engaging with SilasBarta when I had first started taking Adderall regularly. There's a reason we use the phrase "mind-killer" for these topics.

Replies from: James_Miller
comment by James_Miller · 2012-05-13T06:45:45.778Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Perhaps in a few days Aurini will confess that his post was a mind-killing experiment.

comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T14:36:09.127Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Something argument-ish can be found here.

There is an interesting truth-seeking-vs-consequentialism discussion to be had here, but I'll just let the rest of your comment slide.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:49:43.599Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

So... race realists who argue that Asians have higher IQs than whites are racist against Asians...

cough strawman cough

Not to mention it completely ignores the video which (I suspect) confused your inferior brain.

Replies from: David_Gerard
comment by David_Gerard · 2012-05-11T16:11:14.127Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

In practice it tends toward a form of orientalism.

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T13:29:49.321Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Nitpick:

[03:15] It's between 7.5 and 8 times as likely that a black person will commit a violent crime as a white person.

How was this statistic collected? I suspect what they actually found is that it's between 7.5 and 8 times as likely that a black person will get caught having committed a violent crime as a white person.

Replies from: CharlieSheen, Aurini, othercriteria, beoShaffer
comment by CharlieSheen · 2012-05-11T14:07:17.611Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Nah.

As I have said before:

If you want to quibble that government is more likley to make things that men, the young and black people do, illegal feel free to, but considering all three opening statements are also true for violent crimes and that victim reports basically match arrest ratios on all of them. I think all three are blatantly obviously true, but somewhat impolite to state.

Especially since the given numbers more or less match the findings of the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). A factor of 7 is pretty much in the range for some crimes, though I don't recall which ones off hand as this really is a boring subject. But even if the real numbers are like 6 or 5 or 4 times for rape or murder or aggravated assault (for blacks in general the numbers are somewhere there, though obviously men are more criminal than women) else is pretty much nitpicking since it dosen't undermine Aurini's point if we are talking about such huge numbers.

But I do recall something interesting, the arrest ratios basically match the crime victim surveys. Also recall that most black crime is black on black.

Replies from: JoachimSchipper, army1987
comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T14:27:19.200Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Doesn't this just show that the judicial system is neither more nor less racist than the victims? (Honest question, and does not per se invalidate your conclusion.)

Replies from: GLaDOS
comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T14:35:19.124Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I think this is why he emphasised:

Also recall that most black crime is black on black.

Consider that white on black violent crime is seen a big deal in American society, since it nearly instantly raises suspicions of racial motives and is disproportionately interesting to the media, wouldn't the average black person tend to remember such encounters? A different possible explanation could be that white people recall or report less crime than black people in general but... really?

comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T14:27:13.470Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

But even if the real numbers are like 6 or 5 or 4 times [...] else is pretty much nitpicking

Edited to explicitly mark it as such.

But I do recall something interesting, the arrest ratios basically match the crime victim surveys. Also recall that most black crime is black on black.

Interesting. The right question for a white person concerned with their safety to be asking is not whether black people or white people are more violent, it is whether black people or white people are more violent against white people; so, are the answers to these two questions different?

Replies from: CharlieSheen
comment by CharlieSheen · 2012-05-11T14:46:02.893Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Interesting. The right question for a white person concerned with their safety to be asking is not whether black people or white people are more violent, it is whether black people or white people are more violent against white people; so, are the answers to these two questions different?

Interesting question.

Well we can first check out whether violent black & white criminals show any patterns in the kinds of victims they choose. According to the NCVS (2008) a little over half of the victims of black violent crime are white people.

Considering the multipliers I think the answer to these two questions is probably the same.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:21:04.587Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

From what I gather (as I said in the video, I am NOT a social scientist) it's based upon victims surveys; not racist cops inflating the stats, but victims reporting who committed the crime.

And given that the majority of crim is intrAracial, this is pretty definitive.

FringeElements breaks down the data rather well in "make the world flat." He does make a couple of errors, and I'm sure you could criticize him for hours... or you could check out the FBI survey I mentioned.

comment by othercriteria · 2012-05-11T16:37:37.487Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Regardless of how this statistic is calculated, it seems like an incorrect one to be looking at, since it doesn't address the absolute level of risk involved.

Epidemiology has some good definitions for dealing with the risk of a low probability event under various actions. I imagine a rationalist would find a statistic like "I would need to walk through a neighborhood of people not of my race 600 times for me to expect to be mugged 1 additional time" more likely to change his or her behavior.

comment by beoShaffer · 2012-05-11T15:06:48.016Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

black person will get caught having committed a violent crime as a black person.

Is the second one supposed to be white person?

Replies from: army1987
comment by A1987dM (army1987) · 2012-05-11T15:55:00.030Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Yes. Thanks. Fixed.

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T10:44:09.905Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Prediction: this post will end up in Discussion one way or the other.

Replies from: None
comment by [deleted] · 2012-05-11T10:52:43.809Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Prediction: More people actually read Discussion than non-promoted Main. I think I read recently someone commenting that on LessWrong Comments are more interesting than Discussion is more interesting than Main.

I guess Aurini probably won't have a problem with that.

comment by Icehawk78 · 2012-05-16T15:25:07.516Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

For reference: It is currently 11:20 EST, Wednesday, May 16th. The comment to the main article saying "I've been a jerk, will delete this in 48 hours" was posted at 04:05 EST, Saturday, May 12th, approximately 103 hours from now.

I do not support deleting articles which have been posted and to which you've received a negative response to, but I also wanted to point out that the last statement made is another factual error. My preference, if anything is done to correct this, would be simply to remove the "This will be deleted in 48 hours" and possibly be replaced with an apology, if Aurini feels apologetic, or just leaving the "I've acted like a jerk" on its own.

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:33:08.693Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Are races real? Human differences are real and whether you want to call them races or breeds or subspecies dosen't really matter...

The above links to an interesting interview with Henry Harpending on the subject of race and HBD/RR.

comment by nykos · 2012-06-03T12:37:52.295Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Given that the burden of proof regarding the equality of intelligence of human populations that have evolved in reproductive isolation from each other for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of years, and in radically different environments (of varying survival difficulty), lies with the egalitarians claiming that all human populations have the same intelligence distribution - I'd say that this article doesn't even belong on LessWrong.

What we need instead is either: a) An article explaining natural selection to those who don't understand where people who don't believe in human neurological uniformity are coming from; b) An article that proves that ALL biomes on planet Earth have had the exact same selection pressures for intelligence in modern H.sapiens throughout the past 100,000 years. Furthermore, unless you have a belief that Homo sapiens, Homo neanderthalensis and Denisovans had the exact same intelligence distribution, this article must prove that the 2-3% Neanderthal admixture in all non-Africans and the 5% Denisovan admixture in some Oceanians is not related to brain function and intelligence.

Sadly, we live in a world where human neurological uniformity is the null hypothesis even for people who should know better, given knowledge of evolution by natural selection.

comment by sheavalentine · 2013-06-10T03:54:59.706Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I really thought the fist time I commented would be about Kolmogorov Complexity or Quantum Mechanics... but this was too much. There are so many things wrong with this... I had to seriously ponder necroing this, but, no... just no.

"Racism. The term has essentially lost all meaning ... the original meaning of racism was." This is already incorrect. Our colloquila definition of racism is not /at all/ related to the original meaning. The original meaning was "The belief that humans are distinguishable by races." That is it. It is the belief that there is such a thing as race. Note, that already, 'race realism' is just another word for "racism", and studies that base things on race are definitionally racist by the "original meaning of racism".

You want the term racism to be "irrational unjustified hatred for the sake of hatred". Which already doesn't make any sense because it is completely devoid of the use of race... but perhaps I'm just being pedantic.
The problem with this is that it completely ignores the fact that racism was a 17th century invention of European colonialism. No one refers to White and Black people before Chattel Slavery in the United States. It is entirely and exclusively an invention of European Colonialism, and that is a historical fact.

So when we talk about 'race realism', we're studying "Is there a biological justification for a distinction invented to entrench colonial powers". That in and of itself is not a question without merit, but it has an extremely low Bayesian prior.

"When it comes to violence, there is a very large gap between white and black incidences of violence. " Sure this is true. However there is a strong correlation between a /bunch of really terrible shit/ and being black. Which given this: http://lesswrong.com/lw/8ey/learned_helplessness/ would suggest a very high likelihood for a strong correlation between increased crime and lower IQ. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0191886984900242

"it's between 7.5 and 8 times as likely that a black person will commit a violent crime as a white person. That is an absolutely enormous difference. And that fact is something that's important to remember in your day to day life. Just as you avoid high crime neighborhoods, it does make sense to avoid events where there's going to be a predominantly black population attending, just for your own safety." That's incorrect as it ignores the bas rate fallacy and the targets of crimes. You are more likely to be victimized by a White person than you are to be victimized by a black person regardless of your race. This is a simple Bayesian inference and should be obvious for anyone who follows LW/

"That's a fact... It's not racist, it's a fact." Yeah, sticking with the actual definition of racist, not your incoherent one... it's still racist even if it is a fact.

"Atlanta City. Between 1985 and 1997 they spent 2.1 ... Cato Institute." One attempt to equalize education, spending an unknown amount per pupil shows absolutely nothing from a rational and empirical standpoint. There are so many unknowns here that it could mean anything,

"The egalitarians insist that we are all absolutely identical, black slates at birth ... for some reason, one person makes a million dollars, and another person winds up in poverty, and that there's a systemic demographic pattern of this, that there must be some sort of evil force at play, holding the poor person down."

Yes, because the preponderance of evidence indicates that the demographic differences are small, and very unlikely to be innate. It is more likely from a rational and empirical standpoint that social factors are the cause.

"Now the pure fact of the matter is that if you take any two groups, and assign any variable to them that differentiates between the two groups, and measure outcomes, you're going to see different outcomes." That's only true in a trivial sense. If you took connected or unconnected earlobes for example and measured enough people you would see a difference. That's why statisticians have methods for determining the meaningfulness of these statistics. In the Bayesian world, the update would never be considered "strong", so we'd ignore the data because trying to use it for predictive purposes would probably make our models worse.

"Inequality of outcomes is inevitable because we are all unique. And when you put us into a demographic, yes, each demographic is going to have its own outcomes. " Actually, there's a bunch of strong predictors of income, and a strong wage disparity remains even when those things are controlled for.

"these rich grievance-industry government lobbyists are aligning partly on race. You also have feminism as another huge grievance industry" The amount of money contributed from social justice lobbies compared to corporate lobbies is so small that this statement is only true in bizarro land.

"this leads men to work harder than women at dirtier jobs, whereas women are more likely to stay home and raise kids, thus earning less income." Actually, when these factors are controlled for the pay gap remains... did you do any research before making this video? At all?

"Our foundational myth is the blank slate. And so if blacks are underachieving in school as a demographic and if they are more likely to go to prison as a demographic, we need to actually to come up with a theory of mind, a theory of evolution that explains these differences between the races." Or, rather than attempt to revolutionize cognitive science we can see what is staring us right in the face, and infer from very well established scientific results. Namely, black people bear outrageous conditions, and that has created learned helplessness in large portions of them.

"to fight this idiotic squandering of funds" I'm noticing a theme or "They're spendin' my taxpayer monies...". Any attempt to focus on this as a form of waste is premature optimization. http://lesswrong.com/lw/g8a/macro_not_micro/

"Because there are differences between races." Wait! You didn't establish this. You didn't even establish that they are measuring something meaningful. You pointed out two facts that are easily explained with learned helplessness. Did you even think of alternative explanations for the data set? I'm not even saying 'learned helplessness' is /the/ reason, it is simply more likely than "Colonialists conveniently had it right"

Replies from: sheavalentine
comment by sheavalentine · 2013-06-10T03:55:32.182Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"The fact of the matter is that the attack on white culture, the attack on civilized culture, on our history, is very real." You don't even seem to know your own history. There were absolutely 0 white people prior to the mid 16th century. Don't get me wrong, there were people of European descent, but they weren't called white until much later. And even then White didn't include Italians, Irish, Armenians, etc... So when you say "White Culture" I can only assume you mean "WASP" culture. And, for the record, correlating 'civilized culture' with 'white culture' is racist... again, open a god damn history book.

"Any time I apply for a job, they always ask what your race is." Really? What field do you work in, because that's not my experience. In any case, most companies AA policies don't come from government fiat, they come from the fact that teams with more diversity are more productive. So capitalism is the reason for that. "I know as a matter of policy that if they don't have enough people from this recognized group that they'll hire a less qualified applicant over me, because of that." No you don't. You don't know that at all. There is no AA law in the United States that allows that. Does this exist in your country? Are you sure?

"Just knowing the deck is slightly skewed against you, because of some myth of you coming from a dominant, patriarchal, whatever-it-is." And here's where it really comes out. You sire, can not see the numerous ways you are privileged. That's it. You can not see the way you are privileged and so jump right to the Fundamental Attribution Error. You assume your problems come from unfair advantages, but everyone else's comes from something 'innate' http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Correspondence_bias

"A good comparison is feminism once again." No this isn't a good comparison at all, it's a horrible comparison.

"The fact that we aren't allowed to have men's-only gyms" Are you more afraid of a woman raping you or a man raping you? That's what I thought.

"That we aren't allowed to have workplaces where men can fart" No such place exists. It would be a violation of basic human rights.

"Then there's the widespread attack on civilized values. ... Meanwhile ghetto culture is glorified. There's a consistent attack on people that obey the law. There's a consistent attack on people that contribute to society." I very much doubt this. This might be true by some operational definitions of "civilized" and "ghetto", but no... just no.

"European history, is nothing to be ashamed of." Actually there's a lot to be ashamed of in European history. If you don't think that you are sadistic.

"And yet it's only ever European society, the society that invented the concept of human rights" Actually it was a Middle Eastern society that first codified the rights of men. Where do you come up with this stuff.

"The society that eliminated slavery in the majority of the world, the society that spread medicine and education, and tried to uplift the poor, is the one that's always denigrated. " Societies have been doing this 'throughout history'

"How do you think whites feel? When we see that the interracial crime rate is even higher than that 7.5-to-8 times as violent." I think Whites feel like that shit happens to other people, because it does.

"There's actually more black-on-white hate crime than would be predicted by the innate levels of racial violence." Really? Because this would seem to disagree with you? http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/15/fbi-hate-crimes-target-bl_n_1095465.html

"And most whites have experienced something where they were subtly threatened or just plain insulted by a group of blacks." You really can't see your racist assumptions here can you? Here are the questions. How many whites have insulted a white person? How many blacks are insulted by whites? what are the proportion of the population? You see where I'm going with this?

"So me, when I'm going to hire a doctor, if I see that you have black skin, I am going to assume on default that you got the job through affirmative action ... you're being treated like a child" Okay, so you are in fact a racist. This would have gone faster if you started with this.

"And then there's the attack on civilized values." You keep saying that! What does that even mean?

"the ghetto culture is killing the black race" The black race huh? Does that include Australian Aborigines? What about South Indians? How much "black" makes someone a member of this "race"?

"the glorification of the ghetto hip-hop culture" You clearly don't know anything about hip-hop. And equating hip-hop with anti-white is like equating punk with anti-black.

"It's not only insulting and bad for the whites living in the suburb, it's destructive and bad for the blacks living in the ghettos. Celebrating their underperformance, rather than encouraging them, to do the best that they can. " Wait, I thought encouraging them to do the best they can was "pointless"...

"individually? it makes sense to avoid large black gatherings if you're a white person, or even for that matter if you're a black person. Violence is more likely to happen at those sorts of places." That's not actually what the statistics say, at all. You're still more likely to be harmed by a white person. Also, the locational aspect is not relevant.
According to similar statistics, by your reasoning, you should avoid being with your friends and being in a car with someone else, because /statistically/ that's more likely to result in harm.

"So is race realism racist? Well, not really." No, it's always racist as long as it assumes race is a relevant measure before digging into demography.

comment by neq1 · 2012-05-11T13:49:02.366Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Downvoted for use of the term 'race realism' (that's verbal bullying).

Replies from: Multiheaded, wallowinmaya, Aurini
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T13:51:43.872Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Would you please elaborate?

Replies from: neq1
comment by neq1 · 2012-05-11T13:57:10.322Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It implies that people who reject their claims are not being real. I want to be a realist, but I certainly have seen no evidence that any particular race is more likely to commit unscrupulous acts if you control for environment (if that was even possible). It's a propaganda term, like '[my cause] realist.'

Replies from: Multiheaded, Jayson_Virissimo, GLaDOS, Aurini
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:04:02.101Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This might or might not be so, however, if you suddenly saw strong evidence to the contrary, would you hold the genetically afflicted race in disgust and contempt, treating it as having less moral worth than the more fortunate races? Or would you try to help its members eliminate the unwanted cultural/behavioral differences (without necessarily harming yourself in any way)?

Replies from: Oligopsony, Aurini, neq1
comment by Oligopsony · 2012-05-11T14:37:48.024Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I might subjectively feel like I would. But believing that I would is flattering to me, and the two convictions appear to be quite negatively correlated. And for the great majority of things that fit this pattern, for a great majority of people the subjective feeling would be wrong.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:41:59.240Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Then I confess that we must be different in this regard: I already believe a weak form of that thing about genetic affliction predisposing its victims for destructive behavior, and because of that I feel more sympathetic to e.g. poor people of African descent who can't handle modern society, not less.

Replies from: Oligopsony
comment by Oligopsony · 2012-05-11T15:00:02.779Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Well, you already believe it, so you have access to better information!

I suppose I could extrapolate from my intuitions on individual differences: I don't really care that someone's genes predispose them to want to do certain things; if they do things because they want to do them, they're responsible (as long as they remain in the range where they care about other people's opinions and reactive behaviors.) We're all determined by our genes and social conditioning, not as external forces but as contributors to who we are; the relevant difference with social influences is whether other people are responsible as well. On the other hand, people aren't responsible for their abilities, except to the extent that they work to develop them or not. It seems to me that (although my earlier reservations about the validity of self-prediction may apply here) if I learned that the stuff that gets called intelligence was more (less) innate than I thought, I'd be more (less) sympathetic to conspicuous idiocy. If I learned that more (less) of it was regulated (whether genetically, culturally, meteorologically, whatever) by the desire to learn more I'd be less (more) sympathetic. So if e.g. looking at the evidence without preconcieved notions convinced me that Europeans were naturally stupid, I might be more sympathetic, but if it showed they were naturally violent I'd be less - is my guess, anyway.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:39:43.549Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

And given that I'm one of those incredibly evil people - what is my attitude towards blacks?

Almost seems like I give a shit about them...

I actually did this video because one of my black subscribers challenged me; I needed to take a stance. He's in complete agreement, from his comments.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:45:20.539Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Sure, sure, I believe you. I never played the racism card on any of you HBD people.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:47:13.736Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I fail at subtelty understanding.

If you read the comments on the video, it's pretty clear who I'm talking about.

Replies from: Multiheaded
comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T14:50:27.476Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

WHAT? "Subtlety understanding"? You're over-reading me, I meant no more than I just said; even when I disagree with people who hold your views (alt-right, "racial realists", etc) in other regards, I've always found your line on the racial question mostly solid and decent.

Replies from: Aurini
comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:56:01.979Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I read unintentional sarcasm.

Your response: Appreciated. :)

I'm not a complete bastard!

comment by neq1 · 2012-05-11T14:38:05.999Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I don't think the questions even make much sense. We don't live in the world that we once thought we did, where genotype to phenotype results from DNA->RNA->protein model. The real action is in the switches, which are affected by the environment (and so on).

comment by Jayson_Virissimo · 2012-05-11T14:19:46.208Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

It implies that people who reject their claims are not being real. I want to be a realist, but I certainly have seen no evidence that any particular race is more likely to commit unscrupulous acts if you control for environment (if that was even possible). It's a propaganda term, like '[my cause] realist.'

If "realism" is just an applause light, then why do people (including me) refer to themselves (non-ironically) as anti-realists (like moral anti-realists or scientific anti-realists)?

Replies from: JoshuaZ, Oscar_Cunningham, neq1, Will_Newsome
comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-11T14:38:34.565Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Something can be an applause light for some people and be a boo light for others. Look at how "capitalist" and "communist" were used for much of the Cold War. Also, sometimes a word can have content in some circumstances and be an applause light in other contexts. It seems that "realist" may have both issues in play.

comment by Oscar_Cunningham · 2012-05-11T14:35:37.373Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

The two usages of "real" are slightly different: Race realism is asserting some testable-in-the real-world hypothesis; moral and scientific anti-realism are just arguing about the ontological status of some phenomenon which they otherwise agree about.

comment by neq1 · 2012-05-11T14:26:17.540Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I'm not opposed to ever using terms like "realist." I'm opposed to it as it was used in the main post, where people who agree my views are realists, and people who do not are denialists.

Replies from: dlthomas, Emile
comment by dlthomas · 2012-05-11T23:25:18.007Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I didn't interpret the original post that way. "X realist" on this site doesn't typically mean "person whose views about X are realistic" but rather "person who believes X is a real thing." In this case, a "race realist" would be someone who believes that there are real, significant differences between races, presumably on a genetic basis. A race anti-realist would be someone who does not believe that. Both of these are categories of positions, into which a variety of different particular viewpoints might fall.

comment by Emile · 2012-05-11T21:47:39.999Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I would expect the implicit opposite of "race realist" to be "race idealist"; i.e. the opposition is roughly between focusing on things as they are, vs. things as they should be.

Replies from: dlthomas, Multiheaded, JoachimSchipper
comment by dlthomas · 2012-05-11T23:29:39.519Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

That's not what "realist" means in philosophy.

comment by Multiheaded · 2012-05-11T23:36:24.802Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

"Race idealist" sounds so cool to me, I think I'm seriously gonna start using it for self-identification! I'm indeed more interested in how things should be in regards to racial issues, and how we should act to change them, than in the miserable details of our current plight.

comment by JoachimSchipper · 2012-05-11T23:06:51.444Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Still not neutral. Do you think the people who are not "race realists" call themselves "race idealist"?

comment by Will_Newsome · 2012-05-11T15:20:57.167Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(Tangent: Are you a moral anti-realist? If so... how?)

Replies from: Jayson_Virissimo
comment by Jayson_Virissimo · 2012-05-11T15:31:39.900Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

(Tangent: Are you a moral anti-realist? If so... how?)

I have been in the past and I still assign a significant (but currently less than 0.5) probability to the proposition. I was actually referring to my stance towards scientific theories, which is heavily influenced by Bas van Fraassen.

Replies from: Will_Newsome
comment by Will_Newsome · 2012-05-11T16:34:59.373Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

What are your moral anti-realist fall back arguments? I ask because I don't really understand moral anti-realism and would like pointers towards any of the better arguments for it.

Re scientific anti-realism, I'm surprised that van Fraassen's approach didn't gain popularity until van Fraassen in 1980; I figured something like it would've become the standard position directly following the fall of logical positivism. I don't understand why it can take decades for certain clearly reasonable, clearly under-represented perspectives to gain any footing in academic philosophy. Is there really a dearth of proponents, or is the Matthew effect very strong, or...? Anyway, Scientific realism seems clearly naive—so I suppose there must arguments in its favor that I'm just not aware of...? Then again I'm really not impressed by the philosophers of mind who make scientific-realist-like arguments, so maybe I shouldn't expect to like scientifc realist philosophers of science either? (E.g. at first blush I really don't like the miracle argument.)

comment by GLaDOS · 2012-05-11T15:31:51.006Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

To be fair, my understanding of the term is that it's meant to mean "realism about the existence of races" rather than "realistic views on race;" compare moral, modal, scientific, speculative, Platonic &c. realisms. (And ignore the aesthetic and IR uses of the word, I guess.) So read charitably it's not the equivalent of Scientology, Factology, &c., at least in that particular sense.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:37:06.156Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

OMG, you're serious! Or an epic troll.

comment by David Althaus (wallowinmaya) · 2012-05-11T20:50:26.755Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

What do you think of the term 'moral realism' ?

Edit: Damn it; I always forget to read all comments before writing ones myself.

comment by Aurini · 2012-05-11T14:36:39.200Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Lulz.

comment by geneticsresearcher · 2012-05-19T01:47:39.264Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Human biodiversity is real, very real:

http://humanbiologicaldiversity.com/

Replies from: JoshuaZ
comment by JoshuaZ · 2012-05-19T03:28:33.127Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This is less than really helpful for the matter at hand. No one is seriously arguing that there isn't some degree of genetic diversity that is roughly approximate by race (Tay-Sachs and sickle-cell anemia would be obvious single-gene examples). The issue in question is whether certain specific statistical differences today in psychometric testing and social behavior across racial groups are due to simple genetic differences that are primarily environmentally invariant. This leaves the vast majority of your sources as unhelpful. Meanwhile many of the sources listed in the most relevant categories "HBD & IQ" (which incidentally is a bad title since some of the sources talk about other metrics of intelligence than IQ), and "HBD & Crime" include sources from Time, the Wall Street Journal, and the Daily Mail. These are not exactly sources of scientific rigor.Other sources included in other categories are bordering on irrelevant or best so hopelessly out of date that they appear to be there more for padding and for an appearance of intellectual rigor than anything else (what for example is at all gained from including Kant?).

Edit: I'd also be curious to hear what the category listed as "Ethnocentrism & Ethnic Genetic Interests" even has to do with any of the issues at hand other than as some sort of implicit argument that people have a tendency to support people from their own racial groups and therefore doing so is ok. Since this has an obvious naturalistic fallacy, it seems charitable to presume that there's some other intent here. What is it?

Replies from: CuSithBell
comment by CuSithBell · 2012-05-19T03:58:04.785Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

And what's the point of listing articles like "India Graduates Millions, but Too Few Are Fit to Hire"? Supposedly about "HBD & IQ", actually about education systems and education levels...?

Frankly, it looks like a list the compilation of which was motivated less by a stoic devotion to hard truths and more by an enjoyment of reading about how great white people are.