Politics Discussion Thread (Heated Arguing Warning)

[Nicolae Carpathia]

considering that the statement "some ethnic groups are inherently inferior" is not a novel statement, has been constantly challenged and thrown out on the basis of evidence, it's safe to use a heuristic that statements to this effect are a pile of steaming hot garbage and should be ignored

[Gavagai]

OK, I see that there is a confusion about what my claim is. Basically, Seven and Commodore understand it correctly, Bob doesn't.

The whole dispute in regards to whether races are in fact different in their abilities is only important for me to illustrate my more fundamental point. To be sure in rigorous, scientific way that there are no differences between races but cosmetic ones, we need to know what every human gene does - or at least most of them. We are very far from this level of knowledge. Races are environmental adaptations (and, btw, theoretically similar adaptations can be caused by different genetic structures, so we can't rule out racial differences solely on the basis of genetic diversity inside a given race). If environment may alter skin colour, why can't it alter endurance or intelligence? I admit that claim about intelligence is very implausible: environments on Earth are not that different. Also, intelligence has multiple components, which are unlikely to be affected in a similar way. There are also other issues with this claim. Noticable differences in traits like endurance are more probable, however, and are often supported by indirect evidence (like, blacks in NBA). At least, we know for sure that there are differences between races which are relevant from medical point of view. See this wiki article for reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_h...c_layering

TLDR: My opponents express much more conviction in racial equality in abilities than evidence justifies. I, actually, think that the very fact that they are motivated to discuss it, even not being professional biologists, shows that this is more than a scientific trivia for them.

[Gavagai]

2. It is true that people have unequal distribution of starting positions and that such distribution is to an extent purely luck-based. Case in point: you was born in USA, I was born in Russia. You enjoy a tremendous built-in social advantage over me. Not only I need to make to the top ten percent of Russian society to enjoy the standard of living of an average American; there are things, like the right to fair trial, which I wouldn't get in Russia irrespective of how rich I am and you take for granted. So - does that mean that you should transfer a part of your income to me to compensate the inequality? No, this is an idiotic idea.

But it doesn't make it right.

Are you American? Send me a check, or you are a hypocrite

More seriously, I think there is a profound difference in our views on justice. I believe that justice is an attribute of human actions, so that only actions can be "just" and "unjust". From that follows, that you can't be held responsible for anything what isn't the result of your actions.
By contrast, liberals seem to believe that justice is an attribute of states of affairs - at least that's how I understand Rawles. It leads to a lot of conclusions which I dislike. For example, that you should be sending checks to random people around the world.

[Gavagai]

Has he checked out hpmor? I would actually say it is better than the real deal.

It's "she" She read the beginning of HPMOR and asked me for spoilers until the end. She disliked the story strongly. Anyway, she is interested in fanfiction and amateur literature in general because she believes that it helps to understand the worldview of ordinary people. Yudkowsky is far from ordinary.
(Fun fact: she never cared to read original Harry Potter.)

[novice]

I guess the hypotheticals you're asked to consider, Bob, are ones such as:
If it is discovered that the gene that codes for black skin also codes for lessened intelligence, what would be the moral thing to do?

While that hypothetical seems far-fetched, I think it has been shown that genes can have multiple seemingly unrelated effects, which is not surprising given the chaotic complexity of our microbiology. I think it has been shown that a gene that is widespread in Africa that increases immunity to malaria at the same time causes haemophilia, which explains why heamophilia is overrepresented in Africa, and why evolution has allowed it.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

well it sure as fuck does not, considering how many indian phds ive worked with (a group that has, upon the shifting of racial goalposts, been occasionally tolerated)

[Nicolae Carpathia]

zero to white supremacist propaganda in a single day, smdh

[Nicolae Carpathia]

close this thread before it gets worse

[Gazglum]

It’s certainly getting off topic.

The manoeuvring in politics is just surreal at the moment. Individually, every move makes sense, but it adds up to a very strange game. For one thing, the leadership of the Tories and Labour have both swung hard behind a firm Brexit, even though Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn nominally supported Remain. Again, that is sort of democratic, as they are accepting the referendum, but strategically it means that both sides are going against the wishes of a majority of their MPs, and competing with the UKIP Nationalist party to split the vote of 52% of the electorate, leaving the remaining 48% to…vote Liberal Democrat? If we went to an election right now, it would be pandemonium.

Part of me wishes that the Queen would suddenly break her half century of polite silence and use her prerogative to dissolve parliament. I’m not a monarchist at all, but weirdly, this feels like exactly the moment when a strong Executive is supposed to play a role by enforcing a shake-up of the legislature.

Uh oh, maybe I’m becoming a tyrant.

[Gazglum]

Oh, and as some as you may have heard, Boris Johnson just announced he was not, after all, standing for the prime ministership. After he brought this whole thing on to do just that.