site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 19, 2024

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.

11
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

This is just a straight up gish-gallop. None of these arguments address the central HBD thesis (individuals and groups differ in personality and intelligence, and these differences are at least partly genetic). Most of them are non-sequitors, some are just straight up lies.

To address just one randomly selected point, 'Africans have greater genetic diversity than the rest of the world'. This is entirely meaningless because genetic diversity does not guarantee phenotypic diversity on any one trait within an ethnic or racial group. For example, all SSAfrican ethnic groups have darker skin than every ethnic group in Europe. Their genetic diversity doesn't provide a range of skin tones matching the breadth that we see in humanity as a whole, so why should we assume that same genetic diversity would provide a range of IQs matching humanity as a whole.

The Ashkenazi Jews obviously have less genetic diversity than the whole of Subsaharan Africa, but that doesn't stop them having the highest IQs in the world.

I guess a question I would put to a HBD-skeptic would be:

Why do IQ scores correlate with brain size, academic achievement, income and criminality? What is the cause of these correlations if not intelligence?

The obvious anser to me would seem to be that academia is not a particularly rigorous field and that especially at the highest levels it's primary role is to sort aspiring members of the chattering class into "winning" and "loosing" buckets rather than to educate, hence why so many professors grade on a curve rather than against knowledge of the material.

As such I think claims made based on anything produced by academia in the last half-century or so it should be taken with a grain of salt. Anecdotally the sort of naive symbol manipulation that seems to be measured by IQ tests and academic achievement seems to be only tangentially related to conscientiousness, foresight, and ability to take-on/integrate new information. In fact, there seems to be a tipping point +1 or 2 SD where it actually becomes negatively correlated with outward signs of intelligence as the Higher IQ/Symbol-Manipulation Quotient gets turned towards rationalizing previously held opinions/beliefs rather than updating one's model to reflect changing circumstance or generating accurate theories of mind.

Meanwhile correlation to income and criminality is easily explained by academia's role as a means of sorting aspiring members of the chattering class into "winning" and "loosing" buckets, though I would question the "criminality" claim. Are we certain that the Bidens are less crooked than the median family "unlicensed pharmacist" living in the projects? Or are "the elite" just looking out for their own? Personally, my money would be on the latter.

Whatever you say, General McNamara. Last time someone brought his name up in one of these discussions you just cracked a joke and tapdanced your way out of the exchange. Do you have anything more substantive to offer this time?

McNamara was never a general. He was the CEO of Ford.

He was our longest serving SecDef.

The guy who is the boss of the generals.

Don’t evade the point just because @somedude messed up a detail that doesn’t change the substance of the point.

And that point would hat be?

If there is an argument that hes trying to make i dont see it. In the meantime McNamara's legacy as SecDef is one of why no one should ever listen to WEIRD systematizing utilitarian types who think they can fix things with this one weird trick.

Here, I'll just link to the last time someone brought up McNamara in response to your specious opinions on IQ and you shamelessly dodged. I'll walk you through it so there's no confusion.

Aardvark2:

You're a military man. So tell me why McNamara's moron corps were bad at real-life tasks they were assigned, and damaging to other units' morale even though all what they were different is just worse result on paper-and-pencil test?

You:

Do you really think rationalists are any better at "real-life tasks"? Likewise, if you know many military men you know that the name McNamara is a dirty word. There's a reason that his is one of the only red headstones in Arlington.

Generic sneer aimed at rationalists, twee anecdote that doesn't even try to answer the question. Someone notices.

zPvQINBQvfFR:

Wouldn't that suggest that people who think IQ measures something real and useful in real life might have a point? Guy comes up with idea of lowering the threshold on a mental aptitude test to fill a manpower shortage, and now his name is considered cursed for generations. This sure seems consistent with mental aptitude tests mattering in real life."

Boy it sure does, doesn't it? Someone decided that those silly standardized tests don't really reflect actual human ability, and gambled on that notion in a field where results actually matter. The ensuing trainwreck seems like a big challenge for someone who seems to believe essentially the exact same thing, so let's see how you responded.

You:

No. If anything Robert McNamara illustrates my point that it is possible for someone with a high iq to be a complete moron.

Wow, stunning rebuttal. Sure McNamara conducted a nearly perfect experiment on how much standardized intelligence tests matter in real life, sure the results were directly opposite to what your worldview predicts, but on the other hand you said "No."

Like what do you imagine that people think when they see stuff like this? Your little crack about McNamara being a high IQ moron isn't actually a point. The notion that high IQ people can't make terrible mistakes isn't a belief anyone holds that you're refuting. Meanwhile you have literally zero explanation for why this huge body of evidence shouldn't count. Just "No."

You'll do this kind of stuff, and at the same time act like it's really strange and disconcerting that HBD holds so much sway around here. I hate to break it to you, but it's largely because you and so many others of similar persuasion make bad arguments and lose constantly.

That's what it's called when you sit around pretending to not understand the questions, or play off contrary evidence with a joke that doesn't answer anything, or just abandon an exchange when it's pointed out that nothing you're saying is supported by the facts. Losing an argument. You do it constantly, and it makes an absolutely mockery of the superior air you work so hard to give off.

I still don't understand what argument you think you're making either then or now.

The thing that MacNamara is famous for in military circles and the thing you seem to be referencing is his efforts to make the US Military "More Efficient" by emphasizing technology over troops. Why bother with strict recruitment standards or waste money on training, housing, medical care, etc... if all you need is a gaggle of conscripts to draw fire so the airplanes know where to drop their bombs? Or so the thinking went.

What I don't understand, and what neither you nor the OP, @aardvark2, @SwordOfOccam, Et Al have bothered to explain is how MacNamara acting like the uncharitable strawman of a Silicon Valley Utilitarian is supposed to convince anyone that we ought to start treating minorities as second-class citizens, or has anything to do with HBD, Ashkenazi Jews, or Group differences in IQ.

The claim was only about IQ scores vs real-life tasks in military, that IQ scores do have meaning. You demonstrated low decoupling and went to discuss other McNamara actions (which I happen know to nothing about), well maybe because you can't refute central point? Maybe you meant that lowering IQ threshold for military enlistment was actually good but other McNamara actions are guilty for bad performance of "moron corps"?