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 -
At some point, defenders of this form of meritocracy must ask themselves:
Is the occasional smart ‘poor’ kid [actually a middle class kid with tiger parents] who tries really hard getting an “elite” job really worth ruining the lives of tens of millions of children?
Why did you, the child of a doctor, have to work so hard to get the same job your father had and so would for fundamental genetic and cultural reasons likely also perform well at? Why did I have to work so hard to get into the same business as my father? And despite this, half the doctors I know come from medical families and half the people I work with also have or had a parent or both in finance. What a waste of everyone’s time.
This also has nothing to do with, as is sometimes mooted, the risk of socialism or the movement for workers rights (a product of 1890-1950, whereas popular PMC meritocracy is a product largely of 1985-present). The working classes cared about well paid jobs, working conditions, being able to buy a decent home, not about whether their kids could become investment bankers or ambassadors. If you speak to them today they still don’t really care about the latter, so it’s not even to placate them as some have suggested.
If I had to explain it, I’d say I think it’s about highly paid people wanting to justify to themselves that they got there fair and square. They are willing to hurt their own children for this, to feel like they operate in a “fair” system, or have helped create one. To me this has always felt particularly evil, and I use that word rarely.
I question the premises here. They're faulty.
Your sampling is not representative.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322895020_Characteristics_of_Medical_Students_with_Physician_Relatives_A_National_Study
https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10174736/1/Joanne%20Harris%20EdD%20thesis%20final.pdf
From what I can tell, in the US and UK, somewhere around one in eight to one in four medical students/applicants have a doctor parent or close relative. In Indian samples, the figure looks similar, probably one in seven-ish, possibly higher in some cohorts.
That is very, very far from 50%. We are grossly overrepresented, but we are far from the majority. The actual data doesn't support claims that we could just give up on selection and admit them by default.
Sui Dynasty China? You're off by 1400 years. Meritocracy is not new. The pains are not new. I'm swallowing the bitter pill.
You do recall that essay where I said that my dad didn't come from a pedigree of doctors right? That he was a refugee without two rupee coins to rub together? That meritocracy lifted him out of the gutter? I hope you do. After all, it was the largest salvo I've fired in our ongoing debate about meritocracy. You should realize that this standard, applied honestly, would mean that he never became a doctor, and that I wouldn't be here because of it.
I did not enjoy the selection process required to become a doctor. I have been vociferously complaining about the further selection required for me to become a shrink. I still support strong meritocracy, because my commitment to my principles is stronger than my desire to make my life easier for myself.
It's the same reason I never bothered to apply for reasonable accommodations on my exams. I'm fully eligible, because of the ADHD. Call it a chip on my shoulder, call it a struggle with impostor syndrome or an inferiority complex, psychoanalyze me the way I psychoanalyze everyone else (look at what I'm doing here). I don't mind. I'd rather suffer in a fair system than flourish in a biased one.
If I couldn't hack it as a doctor? Too bad. If I can't hack it as a psychiatrist? That would suck. But while I have a laundry list of issues with the way British psychiatry pipelines work, the meritocracy isn't one of them.
With narrow-sense heritability of intelligence in the 0.5 to 0.7 range, children of two parents at +2 SD will average around +1.2 SD, with substantial variance. So even in your preferred world where you select by parentage, you'd need a filter to catch the kids who regressed below the competence threshold. Otherwise you get incompetent doctors who happen to have a doctor father. And I know a lot of fail-sons and fail-daughters of doctor parents. I was always scared of becoming one. I still am, even with all the objective evidence against it. Mostly because the further I go, the stiffer the competition becomes.
Do I really have to dig out the citations on the strong correlation between intelligence and performance for doctors? Or simply grades (which are IQ+conscientiousness)? I have the Paper B. You've nerd sniped me already. I can't afford the time, but I'm here nonetheless.
If heritability did all that you claim, the children of doctors would breeze through medical entrance exams and the selection would be costless. The fact that they don't, that even doctor-parented children grind in coaching alongside everyone else, is itself evidence that selection does something beyond filtering for pedigree.
My dad worked his ass off (and still does) so he could give me a headstart. The money for extra tuition. The general support and comfort of knowing what the hell you're supposed to do in a med school. I consider these entirely legitimate advantages, because I had to sit the same tests as everyone else. He also didn't hand me as many of his SNPs as I'd like, or perhaps he waited too long and his swimmers became senescent. ADHD with above average intelligence is an unpleasant combination.
I intend to do everything I can for my kids. Money. Emotional support. A proper childhood. Hopefully a smart partner so they get another helping of the alleles that contribute to intelligence (and maybe better looks). I am happy with that. I am tolerating the pain of the struggle to get there, because I'm dangerously close to preferring death over hypocrisy.
The folk conception of biology and evolution that people have is still very Lamarckian in this way. Even among intelligent families, children are still very much a crapshoot. I’ve wondered at times though whether you can breed out some of the most fundamental characteristics in humans.
In any population, you can select for a certain trait and by encouraging its reproduction within the population, greatly increasing the frequency of its heritability and expression. Could you theoretically do the opposite? Take say a trait from the big 5 like neuroticism. If you outright banned the reproduction of all highly neurotic people, could you with time extinguish that feature of human personality entirely or merely suppress the strength of its intensity and the frequency of its appearance?
Looking at other animals, how many species could you confidently express have “personality” in a way that’s as discernible with what you find in humans?
You're looking at polygenic selection, which would be significantly slower than selecting for traits dominated by a handful of genes. But in principle? Absolutely. It would just be a massive pain in the ass, but we've done it for dogs and cattle. There is evidence for weak selection for specific personality traits over human evolution, but I forget the specifics.
CC for @Tretiak below.
When it comes to trait-based selection, whether a trait is polygenic, monogenic—or anything in between—the genetic architecture doesn't matter for the response to selection. Only thing that matters is heritability and selection differential (how "drastic" your selection is).
Breeder's Equation for a quantitative/continuous trait (e.g., neuroticism) is R = h^2 * S, where R is the response to selection, h^2 heritability, and S the selection differential (how different the mean of the selected parents is relative to the general population).
Heritability would be the dominant form of the equation, but you also can’t factor out the epigenetic influence (I would think) unless gene expression itself can be further reduced to strict biological determinants. Which is to say gene expression is also heritable. I understand what you’re saying here but I’m still unsure as to whether it answers the question or not. Or maybe it’s a poorly formed question. I probably don’t have the background here that you do.
Incidentally what does the equation say about people of exceptionally gifted talents that have no known biological pedigree found within their family ancestry?
Epigenetic variance explains ~0% of phenotypic variance. You should probably just not refer to it again and epistemically audit whatever process led you to mention it like it was important.
That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about its role in gene expression.
It doesn't have a significant role if it doesn't cause significant differences in phenotype, because heritability is high.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link