Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.
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Notes -
I've been researching HBD for the first time lately.
Question: Could acknowledging HBD have any underappreciated benefits?
Although there is valid concern that it may be exploited by bad actors (such as white nationalists), the idea that intelligence being genetic (and therefore outside our control) could potentially reduce stress for Black Americans.
No more nagging from conservatives about pulling your bootstraps.
American society has a hard time accepting innate inequalities in the first place. Take race out of it. Everyone understands that some people are stronger, smarter, healthier, etc than others. The "best" idea we came up with to deal with it is some variation of, "from each according to ability, to each according to need." Which isn't even that great an idea because it removes motivation from the equation and it means that if someone isn't getting what they need, it's considered the fault of someone who has ability but isn't chipping in out of greed.
Our second best idea is just to ignore it and pretend that success is a matter of virtue. A lot of our fables expound on the virtue of being smart, crafty, etc. But if intelligence is also just a matter of luck, where does that leave us? What virtues can we improve through culture/external forces and to what extent? What ideals do we want children to strive for which they can realistically improve on?
The thing that I would like to see as a society is intelligence being decoupled from morality. We seem to treat intelligence as something achieved through hard work and stupidity as a moral failing. While intelligent people often also work hard for success, many intelligent people are able to get by with less effort than someone with moderate intelligence. We need to decouple the idea that intelligence is equivalent to diligence or that stupid people "deserve" to be stupid.
This does not mean that we should expect or wish for equality of outcome between stupid people or smart people. I cannot imagine a society where that would work or even be desirable. There will always be high-consequence roles where you want the smartest person in charge, intelligence will always have an advantage in competition, and tying compensation with outcomes appears to lead to the best outcomes.
That said, I think our society has removed a lot of guardrails for stupid people while also adding a bunch of extra unnecessary pitfalls. Things like going from an extended family model to a nuclear family model to a single parent model has removed a lot of support that stupid people would have benefited from, while also leading to worse educational outcomes for children. Making cheap dopamine devices available to everyone over the age of three creates a time and opportunity sink.
HBD will only become NBD if we can figure this one out first.
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