"What really galls me is that this says nothing about women's innate worth, even though the researcher will probably claim that it does."
Sorry? Did you read TFAs at all? The researcher is claiming no such thing. This is exactly the kind of instinctive knee-jerk reaction I was talking about.
Researcher finds possible evidence of difference != researcher implies all women are inferior.
Actually, he noticed an odd statistical trend, and people irrationally jumping on him and accusing him of sexism is exactly what I was talking about.
"IQ wasn't defined as innate and immutable until it came to this country, and half the people on this thread seem to have bought that line---half crying out that women are inferior, deal with it, and the other half claiming that "women's intelligence" is different than "men's intelligence", which is at least as insulting as the first argument."
Actually, I haven't seen one post yet seriously claiming this proves women are inferior. Rather, there's one side using the possibliity of test bias to claim the results are meaningless and the researcher is sexist, and the other side saying "hang on, you can't know that - at the very worst the possiblity of bias means you should withold judgement".
My post was lamenting the people who allowed their instinctive bias against stereotyping trump their logical thought processes, which (forgive me) you seem to be demonstrating for me.
"I'd be really curious as to why women score lower on these tests."
Me too. Either:
The test is fair, in which case it's a fascinating statistical trend that would have to be handled carefully not to be misinterpreted, or
It's biased, in which case we have no evidence either way and hence must withold judgement. It is not possible to rationally conclude (from the evidence we have) that the test is definitely wrong, and that's all half of us are arguing.
"Ah, but we've already decided that it's either because women are dumb, or because they have mysterious, probably "spiritually nutritive" "ways of knowing"."
Again, nope. One side has decided there's a possiblity of test-bias, so we can't conclude for certain, the other side is utterly convinced the study is wrong, but has no actual evidence to support such a definite position.
"I know people with higher IQs than I have who are completely unable to solve easy problems and who would die if their parents or some other guardian was not there to provide for them."
Intelligence isn't necessarily the same thing as self-relience, though. Intelligence is how well you sift data and extract meaning from it - how fast and well you learn something new, not how well you apply a skill you already have.
"I know people with lower IQs than I have that can solve mathematical equations that I would never be able to without a computer."
So they understand algebra better than you. This is a skill, and experience, not intelligence. If you both sat down together and learned a completely new skill, where neither of you had prior experience of anything like it, I'd be confident the one with the highest intelligence would win.
"I know still others who can manage a whole group people and get them to work together on projects. Most IQ tests completely fail to take into account social ability or many other kinds of intelligence and most have an inherent bias for people with the same background/abilitites/culture as those who wrote the test."
That's because everything you list is a learned skill, not innate intelligence. Intelligence is how fast you pick up new skills, not which ones you already have or how good you are at them. There aren't different "types" of intelligence, and when someone starts talking about them you know they're confusing "intelligence" (an innate attribute) with a particular application of it (a skill).
"It is in no way surprising that women would score statistically lower on a sampling of IQ scores"
It's only unsurprising if you can prove the test is definitely biased. What you have is suspicion, and that's not a valid reason to conclude the test is definitely wrong.
"Most people should know by now from their own personal experience that there are plenty of intelligent women out there and if women are scoring lower on intelligence tests, maybe we should look at both variables, the women and the tests, to determine what is really going on."
Subjective experience (easily as biased as any IQ test) does not trump a statistical study.
You're right, however - we have to take into account the possibliity that the test's biased. However, this merely means we should withold judgement, not rip it to shreds as if it were definitely wrong, and that's all I was saying.
"We would reject it, and quite sensibly, because this fact (like his conclusion that whites are more intelligent than blacks) tends to lead people to the illogical conclusion that intelligence is genetically determined."
So you'd deliberately and happily refuse to acknowledge something unarguably proven to be a fact, simply because it was possible for some people to misunderstand or misuse it? Really? Is that a good thing? Whatever happened to intellectual integrity?
"Assuming this data is true, would women be more intelligent than men if they were raised as completely equal to men? Anecdotal evidence suggests yes."
What you seem to be doing here is arguing that because the different between men and women could possibly be down to test-bias, that justifies ignoring the entire thing and relying on subjective personal judgement, from a sample-set tens of times smaller? That's not a very logical assertion...
"After all, the "smartest human in the world" judging solely by IQ is a woman, not a man."
That's completely irrelevent: We're discussing broad statistical trends, so single data-points don't prove anything. No-one at any stage was suggesting that women couldn't be geniuses, merely that more men were than women.
Basically, both men's and women's IQ scores form a bell curve. It's just that the men's is broader and flatter - more geniuses and more intellecually subnormal. The women's bell curve still has a high end.
"So if men are more intelligent, this might only demonstrate that women aren't yet being treated as full equals by our parents and teachers. Same for non-whites."
Indeed. However, we've got some evidence that points in a certain direction. Just because you can suggest a possible bias in the test, that doesn't mean the conclusions are definitely incorrect.
If you believe the test is biased you should withold judgement - it's not a valid reason to conclude the argument's wrong.
"Yet when most people hear "men are smarter than women" or "whites are smarter than blacks", they hear a sexist or racist slur."
Yes, which is why we should be careful how present the results. However, this doesn't mean the results are wrong.
"Because the statistical data does nothing to prove that women MUST REMAIN less intelligent than men. It can't. But since this is what must be inferred, it is better for the statement to remain unspoken."
You've completely missed my point. If this test indicates that men are provably more intelligent (whatever that means) than women, we should accept the conclusions, however uncomfortable they make us.
The fact that the test could possibly have bias doesn't prove it's wrong. If you (stupidly) believe the test doesn't have bias, you can believe men are definitely cleverer than women. If (as I do) you believe the test could be biased, the only logical conclusion is to withold judgement. At no point can you sensibly argue that the results are definitely wrong.
"The thing is, once we form a world view, we protect it. It's so fundamental to how we think, that we would question fact before questioning it. Because of this, it tends to act as a filter to data coming into our brains. Those facts that support our worldview get special attention. Those that do not -- or actually contridict it -- get explained away or ignored."
I agree, but I think the strength of the filtering effect varies between people, and that with a little introspection you can identify and control your own world-view.
I agree that people instinctively latch onto certain ideas and never consciously think them through, I just don't think it's a good thing. I always try to make a point of seeking out ideas that contradict mine, just to see if they've got anything to offer I haven't already considered.
I don't believe it's inability or dishonesty that prevents many people from doing it, just simple intellectual laziness.
"We all do the exact same thing all the time, in whatever area our own worldview comes into conflict with reality. Which is why true scientific objectivity is so difficult, if not impossible. You have to continually check your own biases before absorbing just about anything. It's very tough. Few people ever achieve it with any real consistency"
Granted, but as I said different people do it to wildly different degrees. I don't think it's impossible for anyone to be objective, if they try hard enough and don't sink into the trap of only thinking "comfortable" thoughts.
And if that was what people had said, I wouldn't have posted.
Unfortunately, what most people posted can be basically summarised as "OMG, he violated one of society's taboos! And offered some evidence that at least sparks a valuable debate on IQ and how it relates to "intelligence"! We must now ignore any serious debate on the subject and instead castigate him for being sexist!".
Which is basically exactly the same thing they scream at ID proponents for - ignoring the point and reacting purely emotionally to what should be a considered, logical discussion.
Fascinating. That might be where the word "heresy" is ultimately derived from, but I can assure you it generally means something entirely different now. Or do you habitually only use the Old English, Roman, French or German meanings of words when speaking... y'know... modern english?
"Ah the bitter medicine argument. I find it as suspect as any of the PC points of view, unfortunately. Not that I am pro PC-we-are-all created-equal nonsense."
I agree that the bitter pill argument isn't always applied correctly, but you can't deny that many people instinctively experience a visceral emotional rejection of positions that break their taboos. For example, why do roaring crowds surround courthouses when a paedophile's on trial, and where are the same crowds when it's a white-collar fraudster? The argument may not always be the main reason, but does that negate that it's even a valid argument?
"Do you think [the journal] lives and dies by its reputation or its revenue?"
Frankly, yes. It's an academic journal, not a magazine for the layman. Journals have "gone tabloid" before, and as soon as they lose academic credibility the overwhelming majority of their readership deserts them. I think you'll find the majority of the journal's readership are academics - if they lose their academic credibility, they lose their readership and their revenue stream.
"Statistics can be twisted to represent any facts you feel they should."
Indeed, but this isn't a reason to disbelieve anything wherein a figure is quoted. You appear dead-set against this study, without knowing a thing about it other than a controversial soundbite conclusion and the fact it uses statistics - where does your vehemence against it come from?
I'm only arguing we need ot assess the study on its merits, but you appear to already have decided it's bullshit, based on the fact its conclusion offends you (irrelenvent to its Truth), the fact it uses statistics (which are just a neutral mathematical tool), and the fact that the guy has already published other controversial papers which offend your beliefs (see below).
"Not to mention that the basis for the entire IQ system is highly suspect, I believe this has been succinctly covered by other posts than mine."
Indeed, but you didn't even mention it. If this was the context of your complaint, I wouldn't have replied, because I'd have agreed with you. Unfortunately, you didn't mention this once, so either you posted and studiously avoided mentioning the only valid criticism you had, or you're retconning your motives...?
"I can draw upon any amount of discrete unrelated data points and draw conclusions based on that to suit my beliefs. Where I draw them from is another question; for example I might leave out a variety of valuable facts, such as social status and background."
Indeed, but
1) Although you implicitely accuse the authors of doing this, you have no evidence for it. Hence, you opposition must spring from antoher source - namely, your emotional dislike of the conclusion offered.
2) You've already done this yourself with the awful "justifications" you offered in your original parodic (I'm being generous - the modding says "Troll") post.
"Woo, you don't know much about academia do you. By the way, the man responsible for this was also the author of a nice claim that balck people were inherently more stupid than white people."
Again, more emotiveness clouding the issue. Did he actually claim "all black people are unilaterally stupider than white people", or did he in fact point out known ethnographic trends in IQ score?
And make sure you read the debate on the Talk: page before you dismiss it for being flagged as having "disputable neutrality". It's actually a fair and balanced presentation of a subject people (including myself) find distasteful.
"Again, you betray a singular lack of understanding about academia, in particular in the north. Short of murdering the students, this man can do just about anything he wants, and no one can say a thing to him."
Exactly. Had people ranted about the questionable correlation between IQ tests and intelligence, or the care with which the results would need to be interpreted or presented, I wouldn't have said anything.
Instead, however, the discussion rapidly (and predictably) descended into "OMG!!!1!! He m4de a gen3ra1isation!!1!!!1 H3 is t3h Sexi5t!!1!!111!1!!11!one".
It's just a shame to see people reacting to the violation of their taboos with their ID/creationist-level brainstem, rather than engaging their higher brain functions and thinking about the real issues...
First off, I pretty much agree with you - IQ is not a synonym for "intelligence", any more than "flexibility" is a synonym for "fitness". Rather, I think one is a subset of the other, or at best there is a sometimes-useful correlation.
However, there were a couple of thoughts that occurred as I read your reply...
"For example, who is more intelligent, someone who has a great deal of practical street smarts, or someone who can learn every word in the dictionary in one sitting?"
I'd argue neither - one has a great deal of practical experience (which can adequately substitute for, or be more useful than, intelligence). The other has an eidetic memory - this can allow someone to appear intelligent by using contextless learning to appear a bit knowledgeable on many different topics.
Neither of these are "intelligence", which I'd define as "the ability to process and sift through data and come to conclusions supported by it". In fact (per your example), people with eidetic memories are often slightly worse at processing and extracting meaning from what they remember than "normal" people (which is why they tend to score slightly lower in IQ tests), and everyone knows someone frighteningly intelligent who can't remember to put the milk back in the fridge.
"Does the decision as to which party is more intelligent change dependant upon the situation that person is in? Who is more likely to survive in the midst of a gang war?"
This is a good indication that your analogy is flawed. The street-smart kid is more useful, but that's got nothing to do with intelligence. In a ship-wreck a dolphin's more handy than an emeritus professor of Linguistics, but you wouldn't call the dolphin more intelligent.
If "intelligence" is to mean anything it must be an abstract ability, applicable to any situation, not a specific skill or variately of past experience. Intelligent people, should react better and faster when dropped into a completely new situation - that's the only way to measure the ability to process and parse new data.
"What about emotional intelligence...?"
Again, I'd call this "empathy", not "intelligence". They may be good at using their intelligence to sift through large amounts of body-language data and extract accurate conclusions based on them, but this would merely be a specific application of "intelligence", not "intelligence" itself.
"While being able to learn vast quantities of information very quickly is of benefit in some situations, it doesn't mean that they are good at dealing with their emotions or that they are good at being able to empathize with another being."
Indeed. Intelligence can be applied in many different ways, and some people are better at applying it in certain ways than others. This doesn't mean others are less intelligent, merely that (for example) someone with Asperger's Syndrome is better at applying their intelligence to maths than to assessing and mentally simulating another person's feelings (empathy).
"While I am not prepared to discount the research simply because I hold some naive view that everyone is equal in every way... I don't know how useful the research is, regardless of how well backed it is."
Fair enough. In which case people should be ranting about IQ tests being meaningless or misleading (or maybe the researcher misunderstanding the concept of "intelligence") instead of accusing the authors of racism or political incorrectness. That was the only point I was making.
"Unfortunately, such research often gets used to try to prove some sort of point, in much the same way people try to warp a religious text to fit their ideology. Granted, that isn't the fault of the researcher."
Indeed. This is a very important point, and something to watch out for. However, as you point out it's not a reason to condemn the researcher or the research, just to be careful how it's presented and applied.
Oh indeed - I wasn't arguing for a second that we should all instantly believe the study, only that neither should we instantly condemn it as bullshit.
My point was only that even us (allegedly) intellectual types can behave with shocking immaturity when one of our core beliefs are threatened. This kind of thing fucks me right off when the ID/creationist crowd do it, but it saddens me even more when I find apparently educated, intellectual people doing it.
You're right, in that there have been an awful lot of bogus "studies" published that were nothing more than cultural propaganda. However, the very condemnation the authors are having heaped upon them now is exactly the same thing as that early propaganda was - allowing our emotions and prejudices to overrule our rational, logical side, to reassert our deeply-ingrained bias. The bias may be in the opposite direction now ("everyone's exactly the same", rather than "X people are lower creatures"), but it's still the same error. And given how much we point it out in others, it still makes us hypocrites.
Basically, yes, there were bogus studies produced. But when (if?) another, scientific, one is published on the same subject, by different people, which apparently comes to some vaguely similar conclusions, we should judge it on its merits, or withold judgement until we can. To do anything else is to baselessly (and wrongly) damn it by association.
I see the point you're trying to make, but you haven't made it very well.
"The average man scores 5 IQ points higher than the average woman", backed-up by statistical evidence from thousands of tests, is uncomfortable to consider, but is (apparently) backed up by the evidence. Both authors are professors of Psychology - pretty much the only resource an academic has is his reputation, so it's reasonable to assume they likely wouldn't have risen as far as they have without being careful about making stupid, inflamatory and baseless claims. Obviously we'll be able to better judge its veracity or accuracy once the study is published and the precise methodology known, but the paper has been peer-reviewed and accepted by a mainstream psychology journal, and was co-authored by someone not from northern ireland.
In contrast, if you'd like to submit a peer-reviewed scientific paper to a major sociology[1] journal with evidence for your assertions that the Northern Irish "tend to be primitive atavistic throwback to a less evolved species", or that NI universities are on balance incompetent enough to misunderstand basic scientific method or disreputable enough to actively misrepresent their conclusions... well, then I'll believe you have a point.
"(cf rev. Ian Paisley, female to male drop out rates for Queens University Belfast). Under no circumstances take anything these people say seriously."
One data point. Ok, two if you include the drop-out rates from QUB (thought I have no idea what they might be or what the relevance is). Two data points does not make a trend, and you certainly can't generalise from two different data-points to "anything said by the entire population of Northern Ireland". You appear to have a fundamental misunderstanding of statistics, or you're trolling now.
"Oh and hey if my sweeping generalisations offend, you might want to ask yourself how long you have lived in Ireland, and then you might want to ask yourself why my generalisations offend (true thought they are) and the ones made by the UU crowd do not."
First, I've never lived in Northern Ireland, although I've had several friends from there. Secondly, your "generalisations" (as you loosely phrase it) are non-specific, extrapolated from one or two data-points at best, haven't been peer-reviewed by a panel of qualified experts in the field, and you have absolutely no reputation in this area. You also indicate a very basic misunderstanding of statistics, and since this is a question of statistical inference that just makes your conclusions even more suspect.
While the UU study may be wrong, it has been peer-reviewed, was judged fit to be published in a respected scientific journal by a panel of experts, and was carried out (and defended) by people with a reputation in the field. It is also composed of thousands upon of discrete, unrelated data-points.
Does that explain it?
[1] Not even a psychology journal (I'm making it easy for you;-). You also don't have to bet your professional reputation on it, or go in front of the country's (world's?) media and defend the assertion.
From google, blasphemy is "profanation: blasphemous behavior; the act of depriving something of its sacred character".
So blasphemy is simply refusing to take an idea or thing as "sacred", but treating it the same as everything else. This sounds rather similar in concept to "objective", "impartial" or "unbiased", so it definitely gets a +1 from me.
It's just like "heresy" - a word which means (roughly) "what you're saying threatens my irrational beliefs, so you should stop thinking about it right now or I'll hurt you".
If you're seeking the truth, heresy and blasphemy just mean being prepared to question received wisdom, and not stop asking questions just because you don't like where the answers are taking you.
I'm also curious. This reminds me a great deal of the Iain Banks novel "The Business". It's not a particularly riveting story compared to some of his other works, but it does have the very interesting concept of a huge, democratically run multinational corporation.
Complete internal financial transparency, leadership elections, and the majority of advancement bonuses paid in company-owned perks - it's always struck me as the single most ideal place to work I've ever heard of.
I'm also inclined to agree with Paul Graham - normal employer/employee relationships are basically holdovers from master/servant roles, and so artificially restrictive and inefficient in the modern day workplace.
sure there are always people who'll need a goodkick up the arse, but why does that have to come from a boss, and not their co-workers. If you vote for your boss and you can vote to have people fired/demoted, it's more likely people will get punished for being crap in the opinion of the majority of people they work with, not just the boss's opinion. Whose opinion do you trust more?
Leave aside for a moment the question of whether or not IQ tests are fair measures of "intelligence" (whatever that is), and consider the following question:
Hypothetically, in our enlightened modern climate of equality and fairness, even if were proven beyond doubt that (for example) men are more intelligent than women, would we accept it or (as most of the comments above, and on the BBC News feedback page) merely reject it out of hand?
Nobody would be up in arms if asian students were proven better at maths, or if gay people made better artists, or if women were proven more intelligent than men.
However, the first suggestion that the perceived majority group (straight white males) might be better than any minority, at anything, threatens us - just listen to the knee-jerk reaction of almost-unanimous disapproval.
The experimental procedure and results haven't been published yet - nobody even knows what the numbers are, how the trial was conducted or even what IQ test(s) were used, and yet here we have people who know nothing but a soundbite about the final conclusion of the study, already feeling justified in ripping it to shreds.
This has none of the justifications of considered intellectual doubt, and all of the hallmarks of instinctive emotional rejection.
Regarding the researcher's other work, does this necessarily prove he's a bigot? Could he (in fact) be merely discovering unexpected and therefore interesting statistical trends?
Racists claim that one race is unilaterally better than another, and this is (rightly) universally recognised as bad. However, wishful-thinking political correctness stipulates there's no difference between any groups of people, and this is clearly bullshit. Adults are stronger than kids. Men are generally stronger than women. Women are generally more empathic than men. And yes, black men on average have bigger (longer but thinner) penises than white men - look up the statistics.
These facts have been statistically proven time and time again, yet because they don't fit with our prevailing ideology we pretend they don't exist. This is no less intellectually dishonest than creationists who selectively ignore evidence that contradicts their position.
If we truly believing in science, mathematics and rationality means sometimes having to confront facts or possibilities that make us uncomfortable. Putting our hands over our ears and singing "Lalalalalala" is just as bad when we do it as when the ID or creationist crew do the same.
Assuming the study's accurate and valid, does this mean that women are stupid? No, it means that the average woman is (almost unmeasurably) less "intelligent" (whatever that means) than the average man. It means that men are more likely to be geniuses, not that women can't be.
Get down off your high-horses, reign in the emotion and behave in the same way we demand of the creationists - rational, sensible, and valuing Correct thoughts over Comfortable ones.
"God speaks to me. Not in words, so don't ask me to describe his voice. However God gives me a message from time to time, (Note, years between messages are normal) that cannot be ignored. Of course you from the outside will disagree that it is a message from God if I state them, so I won't."
That's fair enough, but again - how do you distinguish genuine messages from God from a sudden idea, subconscious action, temporal-lobe epilepsy or (in an extreme case) schizophrenia?
I don't mean to be offensive, but schizophrenics (for example) also sometimes claim to receive instructions from God. Do you believe them to be also correct (so God really sometimes asks people to take a shit in a baby-carriage), or not? If not, how can you be sure? This is the position the rest of us find ourselves in - identical symptoms, irrational (to us) beliefs, but we're supposed to believe one group and not the other?
"Prove I really exist. We have not met."
I can't prove you exist beyond all doubt (I could have posted your response using a different UID then forgotten about it, or I could just be a brain in a jar being fed sensations by a computer). However, assuming the "real world" exists at all (occam's razor), the fact that any other people exist (which all the evidence points to) and the fact that I've never been diagnosed amnesiac or schizophrenic, the balance of probability indicates that someone else exists, and posted a response to my message.
Ultimately you can't prove anything beyond all doubt, but people generally believe things they can prove beyond reasonable doubt. Everyone lives their entire lives according to this standard - us non-believers just don't understand why believers make an exception in that one instance.
"Or at least socks are a strong enough illusion that you think they exists and can find no way to disprove it."
Exactly. But other people also experience my-sock-existence, so Occam's razor leads me to believe beyond reasonable doubt that socks really do exist.
In contrast, nobody else directly shared a single one of your religious experiences (I can carry out double-blind trials with sock-existence), so you don't have independant verification.
In addition, there are other groups of people reporting identical experiences to yours (in fact, often proper sensory hallucinations, so stronger experiences), and they're classified as mentally ill, even by religious believers.
Basically, if I were to suddenly see and hear giant purple cows floating among the clouds, I'd assume I'd gone mad sooner than I'd assume they were real, since all my (and other peoples') experience to date suggests things like this simply don't exist.
In contrast, merely getting a strong feeling about something wouldn't be nearly enough to make me make the jump to believing in a omnipotent, omniscient, intelligent being capable of violating the laws of physics who had been steering and watching over humanity since the dawn of time.
Basically, I find it far easier to believe in proven phenomena like temporal-lobe epilepsy (also known as "religious experiences on tap") than in something so amazingly far away from everyday experience as God.
As they say, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and there doesn't seem to be any observed phenomena that are quite extraordinary enough to justify an explanation so "out there". As I see it, one can only believe by rejecting Occam's razor, one of the fundamental axioms of rationality.
"Not exactly, it makes me uneasy that I could be misunderstanding the message."
With the greatest respect, that suggests you've immediately accepted the phonomenon as real without engaging in any critical thought. By comparison, how would you feel if you suddenly saw giant floating purple cows, or started hearing voices tel
First off, this is not intended as flaimbait - although I'm arguing against religion I'm honestly curious, and refusing to post as an AC to prove it. I've spoken to many intelligent, intellectual religious people about their beliefs, and I've never had a anything approaching a good answer to this question:
As an obviously educated, skilled hacker, how do you reconcile your (presumably) scientific, rational, empirical approach with your more faith-based (ie, no empirical scientific evidence whatsoever) beliefs?
For example, the overwhelming majority of arguments in favour of religion seem to rely on a simple (and long-discredited) argument-from-ignorance. Aside from this, the strongest evidence is basically word-of-mouth - someone else told you, or you read it in a book that another human wrote. If you lend credence to the Bible based on its age, surely you should lend even greater credence to, for example, Zoroastrianism, since it has an even greater claim of seniority?
Given that all major religions are supported by a pretty much equal amount of hard evidence (ie, very little), how did you conclude that your precise brand of Christianity was the correct one, and not Buddhism, Islam or Hinduism (or strict orthodox FSMism;-)?
Did you compare-and-contrast every common religious approach, or did you merely settle for the first (or most accessible) one you came across? If so, what are the statistical chances that the one sub-branch of the one religion you happened to be most in contact with is actually the One True Religion?
If God himself decided you should be guided to Christianity (eg, by being born in a Christian country), what about all those he apparently forsakes by allowing them to be born into a Hindu, Sikh or Muslim country?
Basically, how do you conclude that any particular religious position is more True than any other (including FSMism)? And if you allow your religious side to trump the question with "unconditional belief", doesn't that make your rational, hacker side deeply uneasy at the possibility you could be voluntarily (and fruitlessly) misleading yourself?
I'm a comparatively spiritual person, but I can't bring myself to believe in any religion I've ever encountered (less possibly Discordianism;-). The problem appears to be that:
i) There isn't a single religion with any kind of hard evidence in favour of it, and
ii) If I'm going to give up requiring evidence before I believe in something, how do I choose between Christianity, Scientology, Flying Spaghetti Monsterism or worshipping my own discarded socks? At least I can prove the socks definitely exist...
Basically, how have you resolved this dilemma, or have you merely side-stepped it and thus given up any claim on intellectual credibility?
I don't mean to be facetious, but have you tried an hour of yoga and a good spliff?
Or failing that, Russel & Norvig's "Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach"? My university-long insomnia cure - never could get more than four pages in before I dropped off...
What's to stop them, apart from simple fucking sense? <:-)
Just because you can choose to not feel pain doesn't mean you're going to be blasé about life-threatening situations. If you know you're hurt and you know you're in trouble, I seriously doubt most normal people[2] would choose to damage themselves to the extent that it become an evolutionary pressure.
Now, the thing I've never understood was why pain persisted for so long, evolutionarily. If homo erectus is wandering about the savannah and he has an unfortunate encounter with a lion, is he (slightly) more likely to survive if he lies on the ground writhing and screaming, or if he scoops up his intestines, holds them in with his hand and runs like buggery?
[1] Also, skateboarders are not normal people. I know a few (was one for a while), and they already seem to have the ability to turn off pain. Or at least, not the sense to learn form their injuries;-)
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"What really galls me is that this says nothing about women's innate worth, even though the researcher will probably claim that it does."
Sorry? Did you read TFAs at all? The researcher is claiming no such thing. This is exactly the kind of instinctive knee-jerk reaction I was talking about.
Researcher finds possible evidence of difference != researcher implies all women are inferior.
Actually, he noticed an odd statistical trend, and people irrationally jumping on him and accusing him of sexism is exactly what I was talking about.
"IQ wasn't defined as innate and immutable until it came to this country, and half the people on this thread seem to have bought that line---half crying out that women are inferior, deal with it, and the other half claiming that "women's intelligence" is different than "men's intelligence", which is at least as insulting as the first argument."
Actually, I haven't seen one post yet seriously claiming this proves women are inferior. Rather, there's one side using the possibliity of test bias to claim the results are meaningless and the researcher is sexist, and the other side saying "hang on, you can't know that - at the very worst the possiblity of bias means you should withold judgement".
My post was lamenting the people who allowed their instinctive bias against stereotyping trump their logical thought processes, which (forgive me) you seem to be demonstrating for me.
"I'd be really curious as to why women score lower on these tests."
Me too. Either:
The test is fair, in which case it's a fascinating statistical trend that would have to be handled carefully not to be misinterpreted, or
It's biased, in which case we have no evidence either way and hence must withold judgement. It is not possible to rationally conclude (from the evidence we have) that the test is definitely wrong, and that's all half of us are arguing.
"Ah, but we've already decided that it's either because women are dumb, or because they have mysterious, probably "spiritually nutritive" "ways of knowing"."
Again, nope. One side has decided there's a possiblity of test-bias, so we can't conclude for certain, the other side is utterly convinced the study is wrong, but has no actual evidence to support such a definite position.
"I know people with higher IQs than I have who are completely unable to solve easy problems and who would die if their parents or some other guardian was not there to provide for them."
Intelligence isn't necessarily the same thing as self-relience, though. Intelligence is how well you sift data and extract meaning from it - how fast and well you learn something new, not how well you apply a skill you already have.
"I know people with lower IQs than I have that can solve mathematical equations that I would never be able to without a computer."
So they understand algebra better than you. This is a skill, and experience, not intelligence. If you both sat down together and learned a completely new skill, where neither of you had prior experience of anything like it, I'd be confident the one with the highest intelligence would win.
"I know still others who can manage a whole group people and get them to work together on projects. Most IQ tests completely fail to take into account social ability or many other kinds of intelligence and most have an inherent bias for people with the same background/abilitites/culture as those who wrote the test."
That's because everything you list is a learned skill, not innate intelligence. Intelligence is how fast you pick up new skills, not which ones you already have or how good you are at them. There aren't different "types" of intelligence, and when someone starts talking about them you know they're confusing "intelligence" (an innate attribute) with a particular application of it (a skill).
"It is in no way surprising that women would score statistically lower on a sampling of IQ scores"
It's only unsurprising if you can prove the test is definitely biased. What you have is suspicion, and that's not a valid reason to conclude the test is definitely wrong.
"Most people should know by now from their own personal experience that there are plenty of intelligent women out there and if women are scoring lower on intelligence tests, maybe we should look at both variables, the women and the tests, to determine what is really going on."
Subjective experience (easily as biased as any IQ test) does not trump a statistical study.
You're right, however - we have to take into account the possibliity that the test's biased. However, this merely means we should withold judgement, not rip it to shreds as if it were definitely wrong, and that's all I was saying.
"We would reject it, and quite sensibly, because this fact (like his conclusion that whites are more intelligent than blacks) tends to lead people to the illogical conclusion that intelligence is genetically determined."
So you'd deliberately and happily refuse to acknowledge something unarguably proven to be a fact, simply because it was possible for some people to misunderstand or misuse it? Really? Is that a good thing? Whatever happened to intellectual integrity?
"Assuming this data is true, would women be more intelligent than men if they were raised as completely equal to men? Anecdotal evidence suggests yes."
What you seem to be doing here is arguing that because the different between men and women could possibly be down to test-bias, that justifies ignoring the entire thing and relying on subjective personal judgement, from a sample-set tens of times smaller? That's not a very logical assertion...
"After all, the "smartest human in the world" judging solely by IQ is a woman, not a man."
That's completely irrelevent: We're discussing broad statistical trends, so single data-points don't prove anything. No-one at any stage was suggesting that women couldn't be geniuses, merely that more men were than women.
Basically, both men's and women's IQ scores form a bell curve. It's just that the men's is broader and flatter - more geniuses and more intellecually subnormal. The women's bell curve still has a high end.
"So if men are more intelligent, this might only demonstrate that women aren't yet being treated as full equals by our parents and teachers. Same for non-whites."
Indeed. However, we've got some evidence that points in a certain direction. Just because you can suggest a possible bias in the test, that doesn't mean the conclusions are definitely incorrect.
If you believe the test is biased you should withold judgement - it's not a valid reason to conclude the argument's wrong.
"Yet when most people hear "men are smarter than women" or "whites are smarter than blacks", they hear a sexist or racist slur."
Yes, which is why we should be careful how present the results. However, this doesn't mean the results are wrong.
"Because the statistical data does nothing to prove that women MUST REMAIN less intelligent than men. It can't. But since this is what must be inferred, it is better for the statement to remain unspoken."
You've completely missed my point. If this test indicates that men are provably more intelligent (whatever that means) than women, we should accept the conclusions, however uncomfortable they make us.
The fact that the test could possibly have bias doesn't prove it's wrong. If you (stupidly) believe the test doesn't have bias, you can believe men are definitely cleverer than women. If (as I do) you believe the test could be biased, the only logical conclusion is to withold judgement. At no point can you sensibly argue that the results are definitely wrong.
"The thing is, once we form a world view, we protect it. It's so fundamental to how we think, that we would question fact before questioning it. Because of this, it tends to act as a filter to data coming into our brains. Those facts that support our worldview get special attention. Those that do not -- or actually contridict it -- get explained away or ignored."
I agree, but I think the strength of the filtering effect varies between people, and that with a little introspection you can identify and control your own world-view.
I agree that people instinctively latch onto certain ideas and never consciously think them through, I just don't think it's a good thing. I always try to make a point of seeking out ideas that contradict mine, just to see if they've got anything to offer I haven't already considered.
I don't believe it's inability or dishonesty that prevents many people from doing it, just simple intellectual laziness.
"We all do the exact same thing all the time, in whatever area our own worldview comes into conflict with reality. Which is why true scientific objectivity is so difficult, if not impossible. You have to continually check your own biases before absorbing just about anything. It's very tough. Few people ever achieve it with any real consistency"
Granted, but as I said different people do it to wildly different degrees. I don't think it's impossible for anyone to be objective, if they try hard enough and don't sink into the trap of only thinking "comfortable" thoughts.
This is a valid point, but it doesn't negate the conclusion drawn, as long as they're supported by the data.
Absolutely nobody can argue with that.
And if that was what people had said, I wouldn't have posted.
Unfortunately, what most people posted can be basically summarised as "OMG, he violated one of society's taboos! And offered some evidence that at least sparks a valuable debate on IQ and how it relates to "intelligence"! We must now ignore any serious debate on the subject and instead castigate him for being sexist!".
Which is basically exactly the same thing they scream at ID proponents for - ignoring the point and reacting purely emotionally to what should be a considered, logical discussion.
Indeed.
Men might not have the same emotional dexterity or empathy as women, but that's not the same thing as "stability". Not the same thing at all...
Fascinating. That might be where the word "heresy" is ultimately derived from, but I can assure you it generally means something entirely different now. Or do you habitually only use the Old English, Roman, French or German meanings of words when speaking... y'know... modern english?
"Ah the bitter medicine argument. I find it as suspect as any of the PC points of view, unfortunately. Not that I am pro PC-we-are-all created-equal nonsense."
I agree that the bitter pill argument isn't always applied correctly, but you can't deny that many people instinctively experience a visceral emotional rejection of positions that break their taboos. For example, why do roaring crowds surround courthouses when a paedophile's on trial, and where are the same crowds when it's a white-collar fraudster? The argument may not always be the main reason, but does that negate that it's even a valid argument?
"Do you think [the journal] lives and dies by its reputation or its revenue?"
Frankly, yes. It's an academic journal, not a magazine for the layman. Journals have "gone tabloid" before, and as soon as they lose academic credibility the overwhelming majority of their readership deserts them. I think you'll find the majority of the journal's readership are academics - if they lose their academic credibility, they lose their readership and their revenue stream.
"Statistics can be twisted to represent any facts you feel they should."
Indeed, but this isn't a reason to disbelieve anything wherein a figure is quoted. You appear dead-set against this study, without knowing a thing about it other than a controversial soundbite conclusion and the fact it uses statistics - where does your vehemence against it come from?
I'm only arguing we need ot assess the study on its merits, but you appear to already have decided it's bullshit, based on the fact its conclusion offends you (irrelenvent to its Truth), the fact it uses statistics (which are just a neutral mathematical tool), and the fact that the guy has already published other controversial papers which offend your beliefs (see below).
"Not to mention that the basis for the entire IQ system is highly suspect, I believe this has been succinctly covered by other posts than mine."
Indeed, but you didn't even mention it. If this was the context of your complaint, I wouldn't have replied, because I'd have agreed with you. Unfortunately, you didn't mention this once, so either you posted and studiously avoided mentioning the only valid criticism you had, or you're retconning your motives...?
"I can draw upon any amount of discrete unrelated data points and draw conclusions based on that to suit my beliefs. Where I draw them from is another question; for example I might leave out a variety of valuable facts, such as social status and background."
Indeed, but
1) Although you implicitely accuse the authors of doing this, you have no evidence for it. Hence, you opposition must spring from antoher source - namely, your emotional dislike of the conclusion offered.
2) You've already done this yourself with the awful "justifications" you offered in your original parodic (I'm being generous - the modding says "Troll") post.
"Woo, you don't know much about academia do you. By the way, the man responsible for this was also the author of a nice claim that balck people were inherently more stupid than white people."
Again, more emotiveness clouding the issue. Did he actually claim "all black people are unilaterally stupider than white people", or did he in fact point out known ethnographic trends in IQ score?
And make sure you read the debate on the Talk: page before you dismiss it for being flagged as having "disputable neutrality". It's actually a fair and balanced presentation of a subject people (including myself) find distasteful.
"Again, you betray a singular lack of understanding about academia, in particular in the north. Short of murdering the students, this man can do just about anything he wants, and no one can say a thing to him."
No, but they can stop listening to him. Sure, he'
Exactly. Had people ranted about the questionable correlation between IQ tests and intelligence, or the care with which the results would need to be interpreted or presented, I wouldn't have said anything.
Instead, however, the discussion rapidly (and predictably) descended into "OMG!!!1!! He m4de a gen3ra1isation!!1!!!1 H3 is t3h Sexi5t!!1!!111!1!!11!one".
It's just a shame to see people reacting to the violation of their taboos with their ID/creationist-level brainstem, rather than engaging their higher brain functions and thinking about the real issues...
First off, I pretty much agree with you - IQ is not a synonym for "intelligence", any more than "flexibility" is a synonym for "fitness". Rather, I think one is a subset of the other, or at best there is a sometimes-useful correlation.
However, there were a couple of thoughts that occurred as I read your reply...
"For example, who is more intelligent, someone who has a great deal of practical street smarts, or someone who can learn every word in the dictionary in one sitting?"
I'd argue neither - one has a great deal of practical experience (which can adequately substitute for, or be more useful than, intelligence). The other has an eidetic memory - this can allow someone to appear intelligent by using contextless learning to appear a bit knowledgeable on many different topics.
Neither of these are "intelligence", which I'd define as "the ability to process and sift through data and come to conclusions supported by it". In fact (per your example), people with eidetic memories are often slightly worse at processing and extracting meaning from what they remember than "normal" people (which is why they tend to score slightly lower in IQ tests), and everyone knows someone frighteningly intelligent who can't remember to put the milk back in the fridge.
"Does the decision as to which party is more intelligent change dependant upon the situation that person is in? Who is more likely to survive in the midst of a gang war?"
This is a good indication that your analogy is flawed. The street-smart kid is more useful, but that's got nothing to do with intelligence. In a ship-wreck a dolphin's more handy than an emeritus professor of Linguistics, but you wouldn't call the dolphin more intelligent.
If "intelligence" is to mean anything it must be an abstract ability, applicable to any situation, not a specific skill or variately of past experience. Intelligent people, should react better and faster when dropped into a completely new situation - that's the only way to measure the ability to process and parse new data.
"What about emotional intelligence...?"
Again, I'd call this "empathy", not "intelligence". They may be good at using their intelligence to sift through large amounts of body-language data and extract accurate conclusions based on them, but this would merely be a specific application of "intelligence", not "intelligence" itself.
"While being able to learn vast quantities of information very quickly is of benefit in some situations, it doesn't mean that they are good at dealing with their emotions or that they are good at being able to empathize with another being."
Indeed. Intelligence can be applied in many different ways, and some people are better at applying it in certain ways than others. This doesn't mean others are less intelligent, merely that (for example) someone with Asperger's Syndrome is better at applying their intelligence to maths than to assessing and mentally simulating another person's feelings (empathy).
"While I am not prepared to discount the research simply because I hold some naive view that everyone is equal in every way... I don't know how useful the research is, regardless of how well backed it is."
Fair enough. In which case people should be ranting about IQ tests being meaningless or misleading (or maybe the researcher misunderstanding the concept of "intelligence") instead of accusing the authors of racism or political incorrectness. That was the only point I was making.
"Unfortunately, such research often gets used to try to prove some sort of point, in much the same way people try to warp a religious text to fit their ideology. Granted, that isn't the fault of the researcher."
Indeed. This is a very important point, and something to watch out for. However, as you point out it's not a reason to condemn the researcher or the research, just to be careful how it's presented and applied.
Oh indeed - I wasn't arguing for a second that we should all instantly believe the study, only that neither should we instantly condemn it as bullshit.
My point was only that even us (allegedly) intellectual types can behave with shocking immaturity when one of our core beliefs are threatened. This kind of thing fucks me right off when the ID/creationist crowd do it, but it saddens me even more when I find apparently educated, intellectual people doing it.
You're right, in that there have been an awful lot of bogus "studies" published that were nothing more than cultural propaganda. However, the very condemnation the authors are having heaped upon them now is exactly the same thing as that early propaganda was - allowing our emotions and prejudices to overrule our rational, logical side, to reassert our deeply-ingrained bias. The bias may be in the opposite direction now ("everyone's exactly the same", rather than "X people are lower creatures"), but it's still the same error. And given how much we point it out in others, it still makes us hypocrites.
Basically, yes, there were bogus studies produced. But when (if?) another, scientific, one is published on the same subject, by different people, which apparently comes to some vaguely similar conclusions, we should judge it on its merits, or withold judgement until we can. To do anything else is to baselessly (and wrongly) damn it by association.
I see the point you're trying to make, but you haven't made it very well.
;-). You also don't have to bet your professional reputation on it, or go in front of the country's (world's?) media and defend the assertion.
"The average man scores 5 IQ points higher than the average woman", backed-up by statistical evidence from thousands of tests, is uncomfortable to consider, but is (apparently) backed up by the evidence. Both authors are professors of Psychology - pretty much the only resource an academic has is his reputation, so it's reasonable to assume they likely wouldn't have risen as far as they have without being careful about making stupid, inflamatory and baseless claims. Obviously we'll be able to better judge its veracity or accuracy once the study is published and the precise methodology known, but the paper has been peer-reviewed and accepted by a mainstream psychology journal, and was co-authored by someone not from northern ireland.
In contrast, if you'd like to submit a peer-reviewed scientific paper to a major sociology[1] journal with evidence for your assertions that the Northern Irish "tend to be primitive atavistic throwback to a less evolved species", or that NI universities are on balance incompetent enough to misunderstand basic scientific method or disreputable enough to actively misrepresent their conclusions... well, then I'll believe you have a point.
"(cf rev. Ian Paisley, female to male drop out rates for Queens University Belfast). Under no circumstances take anything these people say seriously."
One data point. Ok, two if you include the drop-out rates from QUB (thought I have no idea what they might be or what the relevance is). Two data points does not make a trend, and you certainly can't generalise from two different data-points to "anything said by the entire population of Northern Ireland". You appear to have a fundamental misunderstanding of statistics, or you're trolling now.
"Oh and hey if my sweeping generalisations offend, you might want to ask yourself how long you have lived in Ireland, and then you might want to ask yourself why my generalisations offend (true thought they are) and the ones made by the UU crowd do not."
First, I've never lived in Northern Ireland, although I've had several friends from there. Secondly, your "generalisations" (as you loosely phrase it) are non-specific, extrapolated from one or two data-points at best, haven't been peer-reviewed by a panel of qualified experts in the field, and you have absolutely no reputation in this area. You also indicate a very basic misunderstanding of statistics, and since this is a question of statistical inference that just makes your conclusions even more suspect.
While the UU study may be wrong, it has been peer-reviewed, was judged fit to be published in a respected scientific journal by a panel of experts, and was carried out (and defended) by people with a reputation in the field. It is also composed of thousands upon of discrete, unrelated data-points.
Does that explain it?
[1] Not even a psychology journal (I'm making it easy for you
+1, without a doubt.
;-)
From google, blasphemy is "profanation: blasphemous behavior; the act of depriving something of its sacred character".
So blasphemy is simply refusing to take an idea or thing as "sacred", but treating it the same as everything else. This sounds rather similar in concept to "objective", "impartial" or "unbiased", so it definitely gets a +1 from me.
It's just like "heresy" - a word which means (roughly) "what you're saying threatens my irrational beliefs, so you should stop thinking about it right now or I'll hurt you".
If you're seeking the truth, heresy and blasphemy just mean being prepared to question received wisdom, and not stop asking questions just because you don't like where the answers are taking you.
Heresy is good
I'm also curious. This reminds me a great deal of the Iain Banks novel "The Business". It's not a particularly riveting story compared to some of his other works, but it does have the very interesting concept of a huge, democratically run multinational corporation.
Complete internal financial transparency, leadership elections, and the majority of advancement bonuses paid in company-owned perks - it's always struck me as the single most ideal place to work I've ever heard of.
I'm also inclined to agree with Paul Graham - normal employer/employee relationships are basically holdovers from master/servant roles, and so artificially restrictive and inefficient in the modern day workplace.
sure there are always people who'll need a goodkick up the arse, but why does that have to come from a boss, and not their co-workers. If you vote for your boss and you can vote to have people fired/demoted, it's more likely people will get punished for being crap in the opinion of the majority of people they work with, not just the boss's opinion. Whose opinion do you trust more?
Leave aside for a moment the question of whether or not IQ tests are fair measures of "intelligence" (whatever that is), and consider the following question:
Hypothetically, in our enlightened modern climate of equality and fairness, even if were proven beyond doubt that (for example) men are more intelligent than women, would we accept it or (as most of the comments above, and on the BBC News feedback page) merely reject it out of hand?
Nobody would be up in arms if asian students were proven better at maths, or if gay people made better artists, or if women were proven more intelligent than men.
However, the first suggestion that the perceived majority group (straight white males) might be better than any minority, at anything, threatens us - just listen to the knee-jerk reaction of almost-unanimous disapproval.
The experimental procedure and results haven't been published yet - nobody even knows what the numbers are, how the trial was conducted or even what IQ test(s) were used, and yet here we have people who know nothing but a soundbite about the final conclusion of the study, already feeling justified in ripping it to shreds.
This has none of the justifications of considered intellectual doubt, and all of the hallmarks of instinctive emotional rejection.
Regarding the researcher's other work, does this necessarily prove he's a bigot? Could he (in fact) be merely discovering unexpected and therefore interesting statistical trends?
Racists claim that one race is unilaterally better than another, and this is (rightly) universally recognised as bad. However, wishful-thinking political correctness stipulates there's no difference between any groups of people, and this is clearly bullshit. Adults are stronger than kids. Men are generally stronger than women. Women are generally more empathic than men. And yes, black men on average have bigger (longer but thinner) penises than white men - look up the statistics.
These facts have been statistically proven time and time again, yet because they don't fit with our prevailing ideology we pretend they don't exist. This is no less intellectually dishonest than creationists who selectively ignore evidence that contradicts their position.
If we truly believing in science, mathematics and rationality means sometimes having to confront facts or possibilities that make us uncomfortable. Putting our hands over our ears and singing "Lalalalalala" is just as bad when we do it as when the ID or creationist crew do the same.
Assuming the study's accurate and valid, does this mean that women are stupid? No, it means that the average woman is (almost unmeasurably) less "intelligent" (whatever that means) than the average man. It means that men are more likely to be geniuses, not that women can't be.
Get down off your high-horses, reign in the emotion and behave in the same way we demand of the creationists - rational, sensible, and valuing Correct thoughts over Comfortable ones.
Thanks for responding...
"God speaks to me. Not in words, so don't ask me to describe his voice. However God gives me a message from time to time, (Note, years between messages are normal) that cannot be ignored. Of course you from the outside will disagree that it is a message from God if I state them, so I won't."
That's fair enough, but again - how do you distinguish genuine messages from God from a sudden idea, subconscious action, temporal-lobe epilepsy or (in an extreme case) schizophrenia?
I don't mean to be offensive, but schizophrenics (for example) also sometimes claim to receive instructions from God. Do you believe them to be also correct (so God really sometimes asks people to take a shit in a baby-carriage), or not? If not, how can you be sure? This is the position the rest of us find ourselves in - identical symptoms, irrational (to us) beliefs, but we're supposed to believe one group and not the other?
"Prove I really exist. We have not met."
I can't prove you exist beyond all doubt (I could have posted your response using a different UID then forgotten about it, or I could just be a brain in a jar being fed sensations by a computer). However, assuming the "real world" exists at all (occam's razor), the fact that any other people exist (which all the evidence points to) and the fact that I've never been diagnosed amnesiac or schizophrenic, the balance of probability indicates that someone else exists, and posted a response to my message.
Ultimately you can't prove anything beyond all doubt, but people generally believe things they can prove beyond reasonable doubt. Everyone lives their entire lives according to this standard - us non-believers just don't understand why believers make an exception in that one instance.
"Or at least socks are a strong enough illusion that you think they exists and can find no way to disprove it."
Exactly. But other people also experience my-sock-existence, so Occam's razor leads me to believe beyond reasonable doubt that socks really do exist.
In contrast, nobody else directly shared a single one of your religious experiences (I can carry out double-blind trials with sock-existence), so you don't have independant verification.
In addition, there are other groups of people reporting identical experiences to yours (in fact, often proper sensory hallucinations, so stronger experiences), and they're classified as mentally ill, even by religious believers.
Basically, if I were to suddenly see and hear giant purple cows floating among the clouds, I'd assume I'd gone mad sooner than I'd assume they were real, since all my (and other peoples') experience to date suggests things like this simply don't exist.
In contrast, merely getting a strong feeling about something wouldn't be nearly enough to make me make the jump to believing in a omnipotent, omniscient, intelligent being capable of violating the laws of physics who had been steering and watching over humanity since the dawn of time.
Basically, I find it far easier to believe in proven phenomena like temporal-lobe epilepsy (also known as "religious experiences on tap") than in something so amazingly far away from everyday experience as God.
As they say, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and there doesn't seem to be any observed phenomena that are quite extraordinary enough to justify an explanation so "out there". As I see it, one can only believe by rejecting Occam's razor, one of the fundamental axioms of rationality.
"Not exactly, it makes me uneasy that I could be misunderstanding the message."
With the greatest respect, that suggests you've immediately accepted the phonomenon as real without engaging in any critical thought. By comparison, how would you feel if you suddenly saw giant floating purple cows, or started hearing voices tel
Well, here's a clue - it certainly doesn't simply attentuate after a few hundred metres, leaving nothing behind but a column of hot air... ;-)
Seconded. Or how about:
;-)?
;-). The problem appears to be that:
First off, this is not intended as flaimbait - although I'm arguing against religion I'm honestly curious, and refusing to post as an AC to prove it. I've spoken to many intelligent, intellectual religious people about their beliefs, and I've never had a anything approaching a good answer to this question:
As an obviously educated, skilled hacker, how do you reconcile your (presumably) scientific, rational, empirical approach with your more faith-based (ie, no empirical scientific evidence whatsoever) beliefs?
For example, the overwhelming majority of arguments in favour of religion seem to rely on a simple (and long-discredited) argument-from-ignorance. Aside from this, the strongest evidence is basically word-of-mouth - someone else told you, or you read it in a book that another human wrote. If you lend credence to the Bible based on its age, surely you should lend even greater credence to, for example, Zoroastrianism, since it has an even greater claim of seniority?
Given that all major religions are supported by a pretty much equal amount of hard evidence (ie, very little), how did you conclude that your precise brand of Christianity was the correct one, and not Buddhism, Islam or Hinduism (or strict orthodox FSMism
Did you compare-and-contrast every common religious approach, or did you merely settle for the first (or most accessible) one you came across? If so, what are the statistical chances that the one sub-branch of the one religion you happened to be most in contact with is actually the One True Religion?
If God himself decided you should be guided to Christianity (eg, by being born in a Christian country), what about all those he apparently forsakes by allowing them to be born into a Hindu, Sikh or Muslim country?
Basically, how do you conclude that any particular religious position is more True than any other (including FSMism)? And if you allow your religious side to trump the question with "unconditional belief", doesn't that make your rational, hacker side deeply uneasy at the possibility you could be voluntarily (and fruitlessly) misleading yourself?
I'm a comparatively spiritual person, but I can't bring myself to believe in any religion I've ever encountered (less possibly Discordianism
i) There isn't a single religion with any kind of hard evidence in favour of it, and
ii) If I'm going to give up requiring evidence before I believe in something, how do I choose between Christianity, Scientology, Flying Spaghetti Monsterism or worshipping my own discarded socks? At least I can prove the socks definitely exist...
Basically, how have you resolved this dilemma, or have you merely side-stepped it and thus given up any claim on intellectual credibility?
I don't mean to be facetious, but have you tried an hour of yoga and a good spliff?
Or failing that, Russel & Norvig's "Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach"? My university-long insomnia cure - never could get more than four pages in before I dropped off...
What's to stop them, apart from simple fucking sense? <:-)
;-)
Just because you can choose to not feel pain doesn't mean you're going to be blasé about life-threatening situations. If you know you're hurt and you know you're in trouble, I seriously doubt most normal people[2] would choose to damage themselves to the extent that it become an evolutionary pressure.
Now, the thing I've never understood was why pain persisted for so long, evolutionarily. If homo erectus is wandering about the savannah and he has an unfortunate encounter with a lion, is he (slightly) more likely to survive if he lies on the ground writhing and screaming, or if he scoops up his intestines, holds them in with his hand and runs like buggery?
[1] Also, skateboarders are not normal people. I know a few (was one for a while), and they already seem to have the ability to turn off pain. Or at least, not the sense to learn form their injuries
Nah - I had my fill[1] of teenage homoeroticism playing rugby in high school.
Far too many naked jocks, and a little too much jocularity in the showers for my money. And the funny thing is, they call nerds gay...
[1] Pun not intended
Wonderful!
;-)
You know how fantastically low-brow the thread has got when someone talking about actual real computers apologises for going off-topic...
I dunno... I've always found streaming media to be a much smoother download than one big direct transfer.
And it starts coming down faster, too - otherwise you end up waiting for hours before you can finally finish and log off.
I told you, I was 14.
;-p
And we couldn't get any whisky.