Re:RIP Culture War Thread
by api on Monday February 25, 2019 @12:26PM
(#19247371)
I used to be far more optimistic about this issue and our ability to discuss it. Seeing the explosion of online fascist and racist rhetoric since 2015 or so, the mass conversion of huge numbers of my peers (the "hacker" community) into these belief systems, and things like the Charlottesville rally with men carrying tiki torches chanting "Jews will not replace us" has changed my mind completely.
I do believe that differences between groups of people and genders exist. The science is quite strong, though obviously there is quite a lot of debate possible around just how strong these effects are and how malleable these characteristics can be.
Unfortunately I have also come to believe (based on observing trends like those I listed above) that our society is absolutely not ready to discuss this openly. Not even close. Research in this area should be borderline encrypted in dense absolutely clinical and neutral rhetoric, should be discussed in private scientist-only forums, and should never be given a "pop science" treatment. (Most pop science gets everything wrong anyway regardless of the subject.) Any repeatable study reliably showing evidence for some systematic group difference among humans that has any strong social, political, or economic implication should be treated the way we treat exact buildable plans for a hydrogen bomb. Such things are classified for a reason. The destructive yield could be similar.
As I said I was once more optimistic. Recent trends (and not just in the United States) have changed my mind. Some individual people can face these things and discuss them rationally, but society as a whole is not ready and exposing everyone to this discussion is tantamount to posting a simple recipe for a biological WMD to Facebook. That too would be just fine if we as a human race were much saner, wiser, and more mature.
I think the ultimate reason this issue is so hard is that inequality is in my opinion the darkest aspect of the human condition. Inequality is worse than death. Death is something we all face and it only happens once, but the inequality is by definition unequal and those cursed by a bad hand from the genetic lottery die every day. The placement of sentient consciousness by nature into unequal vessels is such a horror that it triggers us all and inspires every kind of defensive emotional reaction, including of course a desire to hate and discriminate against those that might seem less fit than ourselves to hide from ourselves knowledge of the bad cards in our own genetic poker hand. The majority of the human race can face death, but it seems that the majority of the human race is not emotionally ready to face the greater horror of inequality.
I do believe that differences between groups of people and genders exist. The science is quite strong, though obviously there is quite a lot of debate possible around just how strong these effects are and how malleable these characteristics can be.
Unfortunately I have also come to believe (based on observing trends like those I listed above) that our society is absolutely not ready to discuss this openly. Not even close. Research in this area should be borderline encrypted in dense absolutely clinical and neutral rhetoric, should be discussed in private scientist-only forums, and should never be given a "pop science" treatment. (Most pop science gets everything wrong anyway regardless of the subject.) Any repeatable study reliably showing evidence for some systematic group difference among humans that has any strong social, political, or economic implication should be treated the way we treat exact buildable plans for a hydrogen bomb. Such things are classified for a reason. The destructive yield could be similar.
As I said I was once more optimistic. Recent trends (and not just in the United States) have changed my mind. Some individual people can face these things and discuss them rationally, but society as a whole is not ready and exposing everyone to this discussion is tantamount to posting a simple recipe for a biological WMD to Facebook. That too would be just fine if we as a human race were much saner, wiser, and more mature.
I think the ultimate reason this issue is so hard is that inequality is in my opinion the darkest aspect of the human condition. Inequality is worse than death. Death is something we all face and it only happens once, but the inequality is by definition unequal and those cursed by a bad hand from the genetic lottery die every day. The placement of sentient consciousness by nature into unequal vessels is such a horror that it triggers us all and inspires every kind of defensive emotional reaction, including of course a desire to hate and discriminate against those that might seem less fit than ourselves to hide from ourselves knowledge of the bad cards in our own genetic poker hand. The majority of the human race can face death, but it seems that the majority of the human race is not emotionally ready to face the greater horror of inequality.