Live data from Hacker News

Thomas Sowell interview

city-journal.org

171–180 of 457 posts

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#171
post #37

Thomas Sowell has had a huge impact on me and my views on economics. I'm from a poor working-class background and am often irritated by the needless language barriers of academics. > “Too many academics write as if plain English is beneath their dignity,” Sowell once said, “and some seem to regard logic as an unconstitutional infringement of their freedom of speech.” Sowell is unique in this respect. He's book, "Basi…

You (and other repliers to you) may be interested in George Orwell's excellent essay "Politics and the English Language".

>Our civilization is decadent and our language — so the argument runs — must inevitably share in the general collapse.

https://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_poli...

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it were immeasurable and undefinable, then we wouldn't have studies showing disproportionate sentencing of Black people [1] or the persistent negative effects of redlining [2]. And if it were unchangeable, we wouldn't be able to construct studies to show the specific choke-points of racial inequality, nor suggest policy solutions to remedy them. > What is the systemic racism measure for Canada vs US? I don't under…

When it comes to redlining, sowell directly addresses it in in Vision of the Anointed. He points out that the kinds of houses blacks tend to purchase tends to be ignored in studies that find widespread discrimination. For example blacks are much more likely to want to buy multi family homes. The income and other requirements for these are much stricter which is why they are denied loans more often. Moreover, he point…

I'm not debating Sowell—I don't have the background to dispute his claims, I'm arguing against the notion that systemic racism is "immeasurable, undefinable, unchangeable" and is thus propaganda. Researchers might be wrong about their findings, like in any field, but you can't just handwave the research as dogma.

If Sowell is responding to specific claims made by researchers of systemic racism, then it can't possibly be merely empty rhetoric, it's a subject of active academic inquiry.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you clarify "the point of Thomas Sowell"? It seems as though you are ascribing a "point" to an individual, what do you mean by that? It seems like a non-sequitur to bring racism in on this thread - how does Sowell appeal to "white conservatives" more than conservatives of other backgrounds?

because they can hold him up as an unbiased intellectual despite the fact that most of the opinions that he voices are trite, and honestly just sound like talk radio. I mean, just go through a few of his statements: " Instead of trying to propagandize children to hug trees and recycle garbage, our schools would be put to better use teaching them how to analyze and test what is said by people who advocate tree-hugging…

A lot of stuff that goes into the recycling bin doesn't actually get recycled though, right? [0] So if your reason for recycling is "that's what good people do", and you don't actually know what happens to your stuff...you're not actually helping. You're doing a useless ritual that makes you feel better.

"What do you call it when someone takes someone else's money openly by force? Robbery. What do you call it when a politician takes someone else's money in taxes and gives it to someone who is more likely to vote for him? Social Justice." This just sounds like a modern rephrasing of Murray Rothbard, I wouldn't necessarily call it "trite".

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/climate/recycling-landfil...

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#174

One important impact he had on my thinking is that he rejects groupings of people based on snapshots in time. For instance, it is very common to use income as a proxy for your economic success, and then to group people into quintiles, calling the bottom quintile "the poor". It seems reasonable, but it's wrong enough to lead to very wrong conclusions. A college student living on their own will appear to be a "poor hou…

It's the difference between being 'poor' and merely 'broke'.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#175
post #37

Thomas Sowell has had a huge impact on me and my views on economics. I'm from a poor working-class background and am often irritated by the needless language barriers of academics. > “Too many academics write as if plain English is beneath their dignity,” Sowell once said, “and some seem to regard logic as an unconstitutional infringement of their freedom of speech.” Sowell is unique in this respect. He's book, "Basi…

Overall, I like his writing, but his style can also come across as dismissive; as though he is obviously right, before he has really addressed all lines of criticism.

When used to explain something, this style is great, because he gets his point across efficiently and provides enough backing so that you can remember it. And if you read enough of his writing, he brings out the nuance in other books and the intellectual detail is clearly there.

But I can see how his straightforward style would be unpersuasive. Any one statement or paragraph or essay can be picked at by someone looking to do so.

As a teacher and thought leader, he's been very successful. As a political commentator, he's preaching to the choir.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it were immeasurable and undefinable, then we wouldn't have studies showing disproportionate sentencing of Black people [1] or the persistent negative effects of redlining [2]. And if it were unchangeable, we wouldn't be able to construct studies to show the specific choke-points of racial inequality, nor suggest policy solutions to remedy them. > What is the systemic racism measure for Canada vs US? I don't under…

Redlining and sentencing disparities are institutionalized racism, not systemic racism.

I was honestly unaware of the difference. Upon looking up the term on Wikipedia, the first line is "Institutional racism (also known as systemic racism)." Every subsequent article I looked at under the google search "systemic racism vs institutional racism" seemed to make roughly the same equality.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#177
post #84
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Be charitable, he could be talking about the Dixie Chicks or anchors that were fired for questioning the Iraq war. Or for the biggest example of modern cancel culture, Kaepernick's firing after targeting by the president.

Well exactly - it's a phrase that seems to cover so many different situations it's meaningless without further qualification.

Puritans left England to escape the English Cancel Culture. Upon arriving, most of them then implemented their own cancel culture. After Massachusetts cancelled him, Roger Williams founded Rhode Island on the belief that religious persecution by the majority was wrong (note: moral, religious, ideological -- whatever you call it, it's the same idea).

This idea of personal tolerance is itself a moral position. Republic government reflects the will of the governed with emphasis on the will of the minority as a FUNDAMENTAL moral belief of the majority. "Free speech only applies to the government" is untrue because that is simply an outgrowth of the governed. When the governed majority actually start believing that "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from results", you have opened Pandora's Box by shifting that fundamental moral belief.

Once you have decided Cancel Culture is moral, you are simply negotiating the terms.

The majority of the US believes homosexuality is morally wrong, but it's a personal decision/action. What if freedom to come out as gay doesn't mean freedom from consequences? What if the majority of people who believe abortion is immoral decide to lay on the consequences? There's a huge list of moral disagreements where the majority could decide to cancel the minority.

Finally, Cancel Culture ALWAYS leads to violence. If tolerance isn't part of the mix (and Cancel Culture literally means you aren't being tolerant), then either someone must change their fundamental morals or must start a conflict. Saying "I'm tolerant" and then persecuting everyone who doesn't say and do exactly as you think they should might be cognitive dissonance, but it isn't tolerance.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#178
post #104
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He does take a conservative approach to a lot of topics... Sowell's book A Conflict of Visions: Idealogical Origins of Political Struggles [1] is, ironically, a very good starting point in understanding what makes Sowell "conservative" (the Constrained Vision) vs "progressive" (the Unconstrained Vision). I think this is the work that impressed Steven Pinker. The categories get really messy, for example when he desc…

Just about every Marxist on the planet believes that we are "made better by social structure", so I think that characterization of what Marxists vs. non-Marxists believe is unhelpful.

A Conflict of Visions is not a book about Marxism, it is a description of a model to help us understand our ideological preferences. Like all models, it is wrong but sometimes it is useful.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#179
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing simpler than misusing statistics. The right wing does it all the time. 53% of all prisoners are black, ergo blacks are criminals. Homosexuals represent 70% of all HIV infections, ergo homosexuality is inherently risky and should be treated the same way as hard drugs. Now Thomas Sowell doesn't say any of those things himself. His points are much more interesting ... to people who have been only expose…

You're projecting your bias into the causation. Most conservatives I know understand that disproportionate black crime has nothing to do with race and everything to do with disproportionately adopted negative value systems in the black community. Specifically, fatherless homes and lack of appreciation for education. These variables have the same impact on people of all races. Unfortunately, instead of correcting the…

> lack of appreciation for education

Have you ever been to a Black public school, like actually attended one as a student? I promise you the #1 problem isn't lack of appreciation for education.

>fatherless homes

Except this actually has a pretty pinpoint time when it began to cultivate and it overlaps with the War on Drugs and the stagnation of Black middle class growth in the 80s. The modern situation is accumulation of these effects, not their cause.

Re: Thomas Sowell interview

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps, but is that really a telling statement about the book or a more telling statement about the current state of academic economics?

It’s a more telling statement about the book. “My book is too edgy for academia” is a worn out trope used by pseudo intellectuals. The real reason Sowell’s book is not required is because it does not involve the necessary rigor or mathematical methodology when introducing economic principles. If people want to pretend that’s elitist, so be it. Antivaxxers do the same thing.

Mathematical rigour doesn't necessarily translate to correctness. A mathematics-first approach encourages oversimplified assumptions. An example is the efficient markets hypothesis, which is the "spherical frictionless cow" of economics.
Post reply on HN