Re:The sociological religion of no biological differences be...
by 2skep on Saturday October 22, 2016 @04:48AM
(#12767873)
I think the article is making a valid point and your response is not the classic opposition but a more thoughtful sounding version of the taboo. :-)
Study of a average 5% statistical difference of a population would considered a valid scientific endeavour in many places yet a lot of people would only raise this criticism when applied to study of gender/race differences.
Re:The sociological religion of no biological differences be...
by xname2 on Saturday October 22, 2016 @12:56PM
(#12769427)
Of course 5% higher is practically meaningful. If group A is 160cm tall on average, 5% higher means 168cm tall on average. This difference can be easily observed by normal person. How would anybody think this difference is meaningless?
Re:The sociological religion of no biological differences be...
by astrodust on Monday October 24, 2016 @12:39PM
(#12780410)
If you're designing furniture, cars, or clothing where every centimetre counts, sure, but in general practice that's almost irrelevant.
Does this affect things like who you should invite to a party? What effect does this have on ordinary life?
Whatever differences there are when dealing with averages are usually irrelevant in human-scale interactions between a handful of people that are, in many cases, randomly distributed across various criteria.
If group X was found to be on average 5% higher in some particular measurement than another, what does that mean on a person-to-person basis? All it will do is bias people in their thinking. It's only when that percentage is quite extreme that it's actually significant.