11–20 of 87 posts
“Perhaps books matter because they encourage children to read more and reading can have positive effects on school performance. Alternatively, a home filled with books indicates advantageous socio-economic conditions.” "Alternatively"? I think the word is conclusively or obviously.
Are you implying here that curiosity and intellectual abilities are genetically inheritable ?
If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?
Unless they control for the heritability of intelligence this is a "wet streets cause rain" story.
Not to mention the heritability of economic status. Rich families have rich kids that grow up to be rich adults. News at 11.
Strongly correlates with socioeconomic status. This research is telling us: wealthy children grow up to be wealthy adults.
They could be a shelf full of $2 novels. Owning a few hundred books doesn't cost very much (thanks printing press), and only implies an interest in reading not in being of a high socioeconomic status.
> perhaps they gained genes from their parents that prompt both collecting books and pursuing more lucrative occupations Are you implying here that curiosity and intellectual abilities are genetically inheritable ? If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?
And you think they aren't? Like there's no difference between humans and amoebas?
> If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?
Now, are you implying that eugenics is defensible? I'm getting lost :)
If you're asking why eugenics is considered indefensible, I'd say it's because nobody really knows what's good and what's bad. Lots of the time people can't even decide well for themselves.
Also, if we took the idea of killing people considered "worse" to the extreme and killed everybody who is considered worse by anybody, there would be probably no one left. So people are somewhat reluctant to try.
I'm delighted that my three boys and one girl have grown up or are still growing up in a house full of books in English, Chinese, German, and other languages. Sure enough, my oldest son makes a fine income as a hacker--but wait, I grew up in a house full of books too, and I've NEVER made as much money as he already makes. A correlational study like this can't show us the path of causation, if any. Any behavior geneti…
> perhaps they gained genes from their parents that prompt both collecting books and pursuing more lucrative occupations Are you implying here that curiosity and intellectual abilities are genetically inheritable ? If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?
Intelligence as we can measure it (IQ) is highly related to genetics (so you can say inheritable). IQ is correlated to 0.86 in case of twins raised in the same family, or 0.76 in twins raised appart.
> If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?
Nothing!
I myself have spinal muscular atrophy and know that my children could have a chance of having it if the mother is carrier of the bad gene. It would be wise for me to chose someone who isn't a carrier (or even undergo a gene therapy, once it will be available).
Why do you think eugenics is indefensible? Because some people were sterilized in the name of it? That's only one approach. You could also have eugenics designed to increase the number of 'quality' people. Say, for example, giving money to people with an IQ higher than 150 to make more children. Or those with amazing athletics skills, or amazing beauty... I don't care at this point, it's only for the sake of the argument.
You could also say that eugenics increases the chances of your children finding a quality mate, because they are more numerous when the state is subsidizing them.
Anyhow, we are animals and our evolution follows the same rules as all the other species. If we don't purposefully decide where our evolution will bring us, nature will do it for us. Without any external fitness function, those who can reproduce the most will be the evolutionary winners. Ask yourself: are those taking care of establishing a good career and establishing a solid financial foundation the ones with the most children?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBqjZ0KZCa0
Again, we are animals. We are subject to the same rules. If we decide to ignore them, our children will pay the price.
> perhaps they gained genes from their parents that prompt both collecting books and pursuing more lucrative occupations Are you implying here that curiosity and intellectual abilities are genetically inheritable ? If so, what stops eugenics from being morally indefensible ?