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Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

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Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#51

Post by hwillis »

adwf wrote: post #4

I admit to not having done more than skim the abstract, but couldn't it be just as likely that authoritarian governments cause the spread of disease (and famine, etc.) through ineptitude?

I mean that's pretty clearly much more reasonable. It's even likely that unstable countries which don't foster services to fight disease are also more susceptible to authoritarian coups.

More to the point, I think framing it as "authoritarian governments cause the spread of disease" is misleading. The spread is not caused by accident or economic failure, it's caused by apathy (although obviously a failed state can't fight parasites). The reason hookworm is found in relatively wealthy southeast asian countries is the same as the reason it has been found in rural Alabama; the governments don't care about everyone. It's not accurate to call that authoritarianism and it's misleading to assume it's simply economic failure.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#52

Post by boomboomsubban »

_bxg1 wrote: post #48
boomboomsubban wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The title states that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism, not causes it. That's not a causation hypothesis.

My point is that the way it's phrased guides the mind to jump to a particular conclusion.

No, you jumped to a conclusion. "Predicts" is not a synonym of "causes," and any confusion you may experience would be solved by reading what they wrote.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#53

Post by jjk166 »

sykick wrote: post #15
hsnewman wrote: post #6

Correlation is not always causation.

I don’t understand why this comment is made as frequently as it is. Do you think the authors of the paper aren’t aware of this fact? Do you think they didn’t think of this when they did their research?

The comment isn't for educating the authors, it is a reminder for those reading the article not to misinterpret the authors' work.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#54

Post by specialist »

jart wrote: post #40
specialist wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been wondering if there's a correlation between authoritarianism and lead pollution. Like how leaded gasoline seems to correlate with violence and crime. Then that cohort (boomers, more or less) became the largest voting block and changed politics. In my grossly oversimplified worldview, authoritarianism is shorthand for heightened fear response and lowered empathy.

Then what word would you use describe the political leanings of a nation whose people feel threatened by something, like maybe the World Bank and IMF rolling in, and want a stronger government to prevent it from happening?

Liberal?

I'm the most left leaning person I know and am involved in local politics. I'm pretty sure most of my cohort opposes forfeiting our sovereignty to financiers.

But I'd say outrage, vs fear, is my prime motivator.

FWIW I've adopted Jonathan Haidt's Moral Foundations Theory, until something better comes along. None of the personality traits are correct or incorrect. They just are. I'm just trying to understand other people better, esp those I disagree with.

Edit, TMI warning:

My SO voted for Trump. And about 1/2 my family are #MAGA. We largely have the same values, culture, upbringing. So it's fascinating to me how we reach different conclusions. I was truly surprised to learn about fear, anxiety, and so forth.

My SO's prime motivator is fear, which she proclaims openly. Whereas I have near zero fear response. That difference is the basis for most of our quarrels. And, frankly, I just didn't grok the difference, so was being quite the knucklehead.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#55

Post by twic »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #46
jhawk28 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or is it authoritarianism that causes poverty and parasites?

The article notes that famine also predicts authoritarianism, which is predominantly caused by things outside human control like weather and plant diseases. Even the Great Chinese Famine was started by much of the agricultural land getting no rain, though the authoritarian government's response was what led to most of the deaths. This would say that the criseses that impact the poor are what lead to authoritarianism.…

> The article notes that famine also predicts authoritarianism, which is predominantly caused by things outside human control

Amartya Sen's work showed that famine is caused by failures of government, not agriculture. There are plenty of cases of people dying of famine when their countries were producing surplus food.

Frustratingly, i can't find a good accessible writeup of Sen's work online, but here's his original book:

https://www.prismaweb.org/nl/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Pove...

Wikipedia has some detail about the Ethiopian famine in the '80s:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983%E2%80%931985_famine_in_Et...

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#56

Post by _bxg1 »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #52
_bxg1 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is that the way it's phrased guides the mind to jump to a particular conclusion.

No, you jumped to a conclusion. "Predicts" is not a synonym of "causes," and any confusion you may experience would be solved by reading what they wrote.

You're intentionally ignoring what I'm saying and I'm not going to continue engaging with it.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#57

Post by sykick »

jjk166 wrote: post #53
sykick wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t understand why this comment is made as frequently as it is. Do you think the authors of the paper aren’t aware of this fact? Do you think they didn’t think of this when they did their research?

The comment isn't for educating the authors, it is a reminder for those reading the article not to misinterpret the authors' work.

I may be jaded and cynical but it seems to me that when people just write, "Correlation does not always imply causation" they are trying to demonstrate how smart they are and how dumb the authors are. I notice this comment come up a lot when papers by social scientists are posted on HN. It appears to me that the people who make such a comment are making a low effort attempt to discredit research by pointing out some trivial statistical fact.

I see comments of this type all the time on HN. People criticize posted research articles by pointing out some obvious reason why it might be false. As if this obvious roadblock wasn't thought of by the authors. Such people almost never read the actual article and have a tendency to believe that their non-expert opinion on a possible issue is sufficient to discredit the research article.

On HN it seems to me that most people commenting on research in the social sciences believe that their cursory understanding of a topic is on par with the knowledge of experts in the field.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#58

Post by jart »

specialist wrote: post #54
jart wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then what word would you use describe the political leanings of a nation whose people feel threatened by something, like maybe the World Bank and IMF rolling in, and want a stronger government to prevent it from happening?

Liberal? I'm the most left leaning person I know and am involved in local politics. I'm pretty sure most of my cohort opposes forfeiting our sovereignty to financiers. But I'd say outrage, vs fear, is my prime motivator. FWIW I've adopted Jonathan Haidt's Moral Foundations Theory, until something better comes along. None of the personality traits are correct or incorrect. They just are. I'm just trying to understand…

Haidt's pretty cool, but I disagree with how you explained his ideas. Best executive summary of Haidt I know of is this bar chart: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dh7OHIPVMAA-OJk.jpg Usually folks I know who lean as far left as you prefer labels like anarchist, or socialist -- since liberal is what the imf / world bank people call themselves!

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#59

Post by hirundo »

> According to a "parasite stress" hypothesis, authoritarian governments are more likely to emerge in regions characterized by a high prevalence of disease-causing pathogens

This predicts that governments will become more authoritarian during and in the aftermath of the pandemic. This is unsurprising given the widespread demand for large scale government interventions. Among the major damage Covid-19 leaves behind may be to give authoritarianism a better reputation.

Re: Evidence that parasite prevalence predicts authoritarianism (2013)

#60

Post by [deleted] »

brabel wrote: post #37
klmadfejno wrote: post #14

The elephant in the room is almost certainly that poverty causes both parasites and authoritarianism

If you read the study, this is obviously addressed - please try to provide specific feedback on the methodology they used that you feel do not address your concerns rather than assuming the authors did not consider obvious points.

[deleted]
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