This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I think the problem is that thanks to certain disgruntled former Mottizens and some other interested parties, there's a reputation floating around that the Motte is a refuge for right-wingers (and this means far-right, Neo-Nazis, etc.) so that anyone who is inclined to the far-right, Neo-Nazi, "Holocaust never happened", "HBD is real science that proves some populations are the natural inferiors to white people", types think that this is a refuge that will welcome them rocking up with "hey, anyone run the real numbers on the claimed death camps? you'll be surprised!"
It's the witch problem, as has often been discussed.
(Re: disgruntled former Mottizens, there's a certain person who hangs around on /r/Drama who likes to give their take as to why they were run off the Motte for bravely standing up to the right-wingers, instead of 'how I flounced off in a huff', and according to them this is a wretched hive of scum and villainy that probably at least hums the Horst Wessel Lied under our breath as we post).
I mean it kind of inherently is, due to the overton window for most of Reddit being like 90th percentile Left to 40th percentile Left, which also produces a lot of the 'I was kicked out of the Motte for speaking truth to grotty Right Wingers, but can't possibly be wrong since the rest of Reddit agrees with me' dynamics.
More options
Context Copy link
Which guy is that?
Biggest flounce I remember was iprayiam, but I’m sure I’m forgetting a couple.
If you remember a certain someone who was constantly predicting that this time Trump was going to jail for sure. I think, but I am going on shaky memory, that the final flounce was triggered in part by a prediction that "within two weeks Trump will be in jail" and of course, longer than two weeks later, not at all, and a lot of people were asking this person "remind me again, when is it Trump is going to jail?"
But the retconning over on /r/drama is fun to read, even if it's not quite how I remember things going down. Definitely still has an entire apiary of bees in the bonnet about the motte.
More options
Context Copy link
Sounds like he’s talking about Impassionata.
Obligatory disclaimer 😁
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
For instance, I think the Lynn/Vanhanen IQ map is for the birds, especially since the 2012 version had to do some tidying up re: Irish IQ jumping up from 90 to 100 (the mainland still remains that bit smarter, even with the new colour codes however, Rule Britannia!) because the data is lousy. Lynn relied a lot on "I don't have IQ test results for this place, but the archipelago near it has this result, so that's close enough" and fudging bad studies.
So while HBD may exist, I think a hell of a lot of the conclusions drawn are jumping someplace that is not steady ground. Are African nations that naturally low in IQ, or is it test-taking ability? Are some of the results (e.g. China) cherry-picked because they only let their brightest take the tests? Do we have any reliable modern data?
We also put a lot of our eggs into the basket of "More IQ means better all round", when we're measuring mathematical ability mostly or solely. Being a whizz at maths does not necessarily mean this is the guy to run the country.
I think the issue is that IQ is measuring how intelligent one has managed to become. But racists like to use it to determine what one is capable of becoming. There was a very interesting case of the Dan Everett and the Piraha amazonian tribe (I can't find the article now, I believe it was in the Times or similar but it was more than a decade ago). He claimed that the tribe had no numbers in their language (only "many", "few") etc. and were completely incapable of learning to count.... if they learned after about 16 years of age. If they learned before then they could count just fine.
Of course there is much more evidence than this about forming connections before a certain age, etc. My point is that even if Africa truly has "naturally" low IQs, this is almost certainly do to with education and if that were fixed the IQs would rise. So again, the issue is that certain people try to look at IQ and point at something genetic but that's not remotely implied by IQ unless you could ensure the study group had the exact same education as the higher groups.
It can't have been much more than a decade ago. I'm failing to find it too, but I did find a 2005 paper where Everett still says "if I am correct that the Piraha˜ cannot count (something that will require much more experimentation to determine)".
He also recounts his wife attempting to teach counting to eager Piraha students over eight months of daily classes without success. If it turns out that their adults are so hopelessly innumerate but their children can learn then that's got to be one of the most amazing facts (whether about brain plasticity or Sapir-Whorf, either way) I've ever heard.
These days, we prefer the name "linguistic relativity hypothesis". Sapir-Whorf has some ugly ties to the Nazi's: they incorrectly used the theory as evidence for Aryan superiority (which is silly if you know German and some other language). Their usage was ridiculous but, like pedophiles, just the mention of their name taints the subject, hence the name change (and, of course, it more accurately states what the theory is about).
I should do a better job of keeping various articles that discuss the theory as it's kind of a pet favourite of mine. In my own life I've noticed Swiss-german native speakers tend to have a problem distinguishing smell and taste. They use the same word for both.
... and the plan is to ameliorate that with a damnatio memoriae on an ethnically Jewish scientist?
I'm not trying to shoot the messenger, thank you for the information ... but I do really hate it every time I see a bit of evidence for the conspiracy theory that modern anti-racism is hopelessly infiltrated by 4chan trolls.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I agree with the criticism of Lynn's IQ measures, but the "More IQ means better all round" has held up pretty well, at least as far as "better intelligence" is concerned.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link