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Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

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Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#181

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

vagrantJin wrote: post #170
NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #152

In these comments: people doing apologetics for a vision of the world where everyone is born with equal potential. I am a scientist, I work on these things, and I am here to tell you that: --Intelligence is largely (~70-80% of variance) inherited --Your personality is largely determined by genetics and is pretty much settled in to what it will always be by ~30 --If you don't learn to count right by ~4 you never will…

> Intelligence is largely (~70-80% of variance) inherited I'd like your definition of intelligence.

"g" is the way contemporary scientists think about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G_factor_(psychometrics)

I haven't read the wiki article and so can't vouch for it

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#182

Post by colordrops »

tnzm wrote: post #172
colordrops wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look closely enough and there is no essential difference between genetics and other causative factors. How is this any different from saying "all is one, separateness is an illusion"?

Arbitrarily.

I'm not fluent in e-prime, sorry.

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#183

Post by thaumasiotes »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #7
linksnapzz wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some years ago, California tried to make it so that you had to pass Algebra II to graduate high school. I think the state backed down from that, because it meant only 25% of students could pass. Or maybe they just bowdlerized the definition of algebra II. It’s too bad, because I don’t think anyone should be able to leave high school without understanding compound interest-sorta vital for participating in a modern eco…

Do you really need to know Algebra II to understand exponential growth? Couldn't you just get by with multiplication and seeing a pattern and learning the FV function in excel?

> Do you really need to know Algebra II to understand exponential growth? Couldn't you just get by with multiplication and seeing a pattern

If you could do that, you could probably pass Algebra II.

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#184

Post by mewpmewp2 »

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #167
ludston wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does your science control for differences between parenting, access to education and nutrition though? I would expect doing so to be unethical and therefore not allowed.

I think at least some of those statements are independent of parenting, access to education and nutrition. Give everyone perfect parenting, a great education and lots of nutritious food and some of them still won't be able to learn calculus.

Give everyone the perfect genes and lack of environment can also cause them not to learn calculus.

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#185

Post by lrem »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #152

In these comments: people doing apologetics for a vision of the world where everyone is born with equal potential. I am a scientist, I work on these things, and I am here to tell you that: --Intelligence is largely (~70-80% of variance) inherited --Your personality is largely determined by genetics and is pretty much settled in to what it will always be by ~30 --If you don't learn to count right by ~4 you never will…

You've made four claims and thus far provided a source for the first one. Any chance for the other four?

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#186

Post by ZephyrBlu »

DanHulton wrote: post #128
syops wrote: post #2

From the article: Over the next year, a biosciences working group revised the program’s funding guidelines, stipulating in the final draft that it would not support any research into the first-order effects of genes on behavior or social outcomes. The fact that this area is controversial suggests to me that it is worth exploration. I’ve taught mathematics at community colleges for over 20 years and I’m absolutely con…

You're making a lot of leaps of logic here, which might be why your colleagues are disagreeing with you. You go from "not everyone can learn algebra or calculus" and "mental disabilities exist" to "therefore intelligence is a scale and controlled by genetics and unalterable," which doesn't really track. Your previous education, your upbringing, your cultural values, these things all also have huge effects on your apt…

How does this not track? It's clearly obvious that there are intellectual boundaries that exist (E.g. if you're not this smart you're going to struggle).

Previous education, upbringing, cultural values, etc are all separate effects that may influence your overall ability, but intelligence __definitely__ influences your ability.

Low intelligence + good education = poor overall ability

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#187

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #178
tgv wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never heard a number as high as 70%. Where does that come from? Otherwise: any idea how intelligence was operationalized? I also think we can only accept that we're born different, but human. If we should aspire to anything, it should be to make life good for every individual, taking their capacities into account, not to give everyone an academic degree.

The percentage without context does not give any actual information. E.g. one could argue that environment affects 99 percent of intelligence as for example if someone dies due to environment there's no intelligence at all. So there must be some poor environment A and good environment B, and some poor genes A and good genes B that a comparison must be made between to understand exactly what this percentage means and…

Thanks for asking, I should've explained. The percentage here is percent of variance (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variance). What it means, basically, is the extent to which you can predict a child's intelligence just knowing the parents' intelligence--not assuming the child was raised by those parents.

In your second paragraph, you've actually hit on one of the apologetic clichés that's popular now. People will say, "Yes, 70-80% of variance...GIVEN OUR CURRENT ENVIRONMENT". And they will act as if they've said something profound. Yes, that's true, and we don't know about the heritability of intelligence in environments that don't exist...but we can make really good guesses. Further, from a public policy perspective, we've got to work in the environment that we've got. And in that environment, the number is 70-80%.

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#188

Post by luckylion »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #145
DangitBobby wrote: post #76

People strongly want to believe that intelligence doesn't have a strong genetic component, I think mainly for moral reasons. If not everyone can be expected to learn and be proficient in everything due to genetics, then suddenly merit itself is also based strongly on luck, and now the belief that people with greater merit should have better lives no longer seems fair. Intelligence is now just another gift to the fort…

I don't believe this idea because few or nobody sees a moral problem in acknowledging there is a strong genetic component to physical attractiveness, or physical features (like height) that give an advantage in "merit" in some paths of life. Nor do people have a problem acknowledging your parents, the country in which you were born, their wealth and fitness as "good parents" for the early years of your life plays a m…

> You can believe it's reasonable for a person who can create more value for any reason deserves to be paid more, without believing their "merit" as a person is any different to anyone else.

I think progessives care mostly about the economic consequences, not a judgement of someone as a person.

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#189

Post by anothernewdude »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #152

In these comments: people doing apologetics for a vision of the world where everyone is born with equal potential. I am a scientist, I work on these things, and I am here to tell you that: --Intelligence is largely (~70-80% of variance) inherited --Your personality is largely determined by genetics and is pretty much settled in to what it will always be by ~30 --If you don't learn to count right by ~4 you never will…

Cool, so malnourishment throughout life will only account for at most a 30% decline. Or is that "inherited" because it's environmental, but determined by parents?

Re: Can progressives be convinced that genetics matters?

#190

Post by haihaibye »

carabiner wrote: post #136

Sperm banks select highly-educated males (i.e. recruiting at Stanford and Harvard) for sperm donors, so it seems obvious that most people know there is a hereditary component.

Likewise a "Darwin award" only makes sense if you know intelligence is heritable.
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