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Ah yes. Unlike the rest of the human body, the brain is the one organ independent of genetics and untouched by evolution. > The idea of a biological hierarchy

Ah yes. Unlike the rest of the human body, the brain is the one organ independent of genetics and untouched by evolution. > The idea of a biological hierarchy of intelligence arose alongside the first theories of human evolution. It never goes away when discredited, just changes forms. In 1810, a year after the publication of the first modern evolutionary theory, two German doctors, Franz Joseph Gall and Johann Kaspar Spurzheim, inaugurated the science of phrenology I see the usual trickery is on display in this article. Knowing that saying intelligence is totally independent of genes would sound too ridiculous even in 2022 (as proven by the absence of cats with human-level intellect), they add a poison pill to it by calling it "hierarchy of intelligence", and then proceed to nitpick at this strawman they constructed, probably by arguing that, since intelligence isn't one-dimensional, and different people are better at different tasks, you can't strictly sort humans from less to more intelligent. Therefore anything goes. Then it predictably proceeds to dig up phrenology (no article on genes and intelligence is complete without triumphantly debunking that), as if there has been no progress the last two centuries. May as well use alchemy and geocentrism to debunk chemistry and astronomy. Anyway, I don't know about "hierarchy", but intelligence being linked to biology is anything but discredited: Early twin studies of adult individuals have found a heritability of IQ between 57% and 73%,[6] with some recent studies showing heritability for IQ as high as 80%. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability_of_IQ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability_of_IQ Oh but that's IQ, which is an imperfect measure, therefore anything goes... if one is determined to remain ignorant, no proof is good enough, and its smallest drawback turns into proof of the opposite - no link between genes and intelligence.

a_shovel 5y ago
You seem to be claiming that the authors of the article secretly believe that "intelligence is totally independent of genes", which isn't supported by the article itself. You then call the ideology of a hierarchy of intelligence a strawman, and proceed to criticize what you imagine their argument against it is, which honestly is kind of hilarious. Also, the article isn't "debunking" phrenology, as that isn't necessary. It's reminding us that historically, the reason these theories of genetic intelligence are created in the first place is in order to support and justify eugenics. And you keep describing the article's argument as being "therefore anything goes". The article has an argument, and I think this quote from near the bottom summarizes it well: > These objections come not from head-in-the-sand progressives, but from logic. Genome studies can illuminate things that genes cause, but genes don’t cause everything. Whatever scientific evidence emerges regarding genetic populations, it won’t explain why some students do well on tests any more than it will explain why some social scientists construct essentialist theories of intelligence. Educational success and biological essentialism are social and cultural phenomena, not genetic phenomena. True, genes help shape people, and people make up social and cultural situations. Likewise, grammar helps shape sentences and sentences make up Harden’s book. But we can’t reduce her contention that genetic differences cause social differences to the syntactical rules of an English sentence. Meanwhile, beneath Harden’s protestations that she’s an egalitarian hides a stealthy affirmation of the old, tenacious view that races and classes are natural kinds.
- car_analogy 5y ago
  These kinds of articles are expert at using obfuscatory pseudo-intellectual language to launder ridiculous assertions. Let me cut through the nonsense verbiage: > Educational success and biological essentialism are social and cultural phenomena, not genetic phenomena. True, genes help shape people, and people make up social and cultural situations. Likewise, grammar helps shape sentences and sentences make up Harden’s book. But we can’t reduce her contention that genetic differences cause social differences to the syntactical rules of an English sentence. Translation: "it's complicated, therefore genes are totally unrelated to social differences". Key in this word salad is using "cause" to imply "sole cause" - an implication reinforced by the article's title, instead of the reasonable "an important contributing cause". Plus of course the tired guilt by association, counting on the reader to conflate "guilt" with "falsity".
  - a_shovel 5y ago
    It's obvious that that's not the point. > To suggest that macular degeneration has genetic causes is to make an empirically testable proposal; to suggest that “grit” or “openness to experience” has genetic causes is to make a category mistake. > Whatever scientific evidence emerges regarding genetic populations, it won’t explain why some students do well on tests any more than it will explain why some social scientists construct essentialist theories of intelligence. In other words, it is as much a mistake to search for biological causes for social differences as it is to search for astronomical causes, or quantum-mechanical causes. Yes, one could easily argue it's the "underlying reason" for the differences, but they're so far removed from the thing you're trying to explain that the theoretical framework of biology/astronomy/quantum mechanics doesn't allow you to draw any meaningful or relevant conclusions. (And Harden's guilt is a bit more than "by association": "In her efforts to assure the reader that there’s no racism here, Harden tacitly—and sometimes not so tacitly—endorses the founding axiom of scientific racism since its inception in the eighteenth century, that human races are biologically distinct.")
    - car_analogy 5y ago
      > To suggest that macular degeneration has genetic causes is to make an empirically testable proposal; to suggest that “grit” or “openness to experience” has genetic causes is to make a category mistake. Oh please spare me. They are both empirically testable, it in fact was tested, and found that According to twin studies, the Big Five personality traits have substantial heritable components explaining 40–60% of the variance - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068715/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068715/ A few more sources: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8776880/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8776880/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#Heritability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#He...

a_shovel 5y ago

You seem to be claiming that the authors of the article secretly believe that "intelligence is totally independent of genes", which isn't supported by the article itself. You then call the ideology of a hierarchy of intelligence a strawman, and proceed to criticize what you imagine their argument against it is, which honestly is kind of hilarious. Also, the article isn't "debunking" phrenology, as that isn't necessary. It's reminding us that historically, the reason these theories of genetic intelligence are created in the first place is in order to support and justify eugenics. And you keep describing the article's argument as being "therefore anything goes". The article has an argument, and I think this quote from near the bottom summarizes it well: > These objections come not from head-in-the-sand progressives, but from logic. Genome studies can illuminate things that genes cause, but genes don’t cause everything. Whatever scientific evidence emerges regarding genetic populations, it won’t explain why some students do well on tests any more than it will explain why some social scientists construct essentialist theories of intelligence. Educational success and biological essentialism are social and cultural phenomena, not genetic phenomena. True, genes help shape people, and people make up social and cultural situations. Likewise, grammar helps shape sentences and sentences make up Harden’s book. But we can’t reduce her contention that genetic differences cause social differences to the syntactical rules of an English sentence. Meanwhile, beneath Harden’s protestations that she’s an egalitarian hides a stealthy affirmation of the old, tenacious view that races and classes are natural kinds.

car_analogy 5y ago
These kinds of articles are expert at using obfuscatory pseudo-intellectual language to launder ridiculous assertions. Let me cut through the nonsense verbiage: > Educational success and biological essentialism are social and cultural phenomena, not genetic phenomena. True, genes help shape people, and people make up social and cultural situations. Likewise, grammar helps shape sentences and sentences make up Harden’s book. But we can’t reduce her contention that genetic differences cause social differences to the syntactical rules of an English sentence. Translation: "it's complicated, therefore genes are totally unrelated to social differences". Key in this word salad is using "cause" to imply "sole cause" - an implication reinforced by the article's title, instead of the reasonable "an important contributing cause". Plus of course the tired guilt by association, counting on the reader to conflate "guilt" with "falsity".
- a_shovel 5y ago
  It's obvious that that's not the point. > To suggest that macular degeneration has genetic causes is to make an empirically testable proposal; to suggest that “grit” or “openness to experience” has genetic causes is to make a category mistake. > Whatever scientific evidence emerges regarding genetic populations, it won’t explain why some students do well on tests any more than it will explain why some social scientists construct essentialist theories of intelligence. In other words, it is as much a mistake to search for biological causes for social differences as it is to search for astronomical causes, or quantum-mechanical causes. Yes, one could easily argue it's the "underlying reason" for the differences, but they're so far removed from the thing you're trying to explain that the theoretical framework of biology/astronomy/quantum mechanics doesn't allow you to draw any meaningful or relevant conclusions. (And Harden's guilt is a bit more than "by association": "In her efforts to assure the reader that there’s no racism here, Harden tacitly—and sometimes not so tacitly—endorses the founding axiom of scientific racism since its inception in the eighteenth century, that human races are biologically distinct.")
  - car_analogy 5y ago
    > To suggest that macular degeneration has genetic causes is to make an empirically testable proposal; to suggest that “grit” or “openness to experience” has genetic causes is to make a category mistake. Oh please spare me. They are both empirically testable, it in fact was tested, and found that According to twin studies, the Big Five personality traits have substantial heritable components explaining 40–60% of the variance - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068715/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068715/ A few more sources: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8776880/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8776880/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#Heritability https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits#He...