Summers Vindicated (again)(marginalrevolution.com)
marginalrevolution.com
Summers Vindicated (again)
http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/07/summers-vindica.html
5 comments
"The evidence in favor of cognitive differences across race and gender is enormous".
That differences in realized cognitive ability exist is without dispute. Evidence for a genetic basis for these differences is pretty much nonexistent. The Flynn effect basically shreds the credibility of any argument from so-called "g". Disadvantaged groups invariably score 10-20 points lower than the dominant groups within societies, and when members of both emigrate to other countries, the gap vanishes.
Frankly, I'm pretty sure that my barbaric, 7th-century European ancestors would have tested very poorly on any IQ test.
That differences in realized cognitive ability exist is without dispute. Evidence for a genetic basis for these differences is pretty much nonexistent. The Flynn effect basically shreds the credibility of any argument from so-called "g". Disadvantaged groups invariably score 10-20 points lower than the dominant groups within societies, and when members of both emigrate to other countries, the gap vanishes.
Frankly, I'm pretty sure that my barbaric, 7th-century European ancestors would have tested very poorly on any IQ test.
The genetic basis is there. First, I suspect the Flynn effect is simply natural selection in modern society; after all, if environment changes in the Galapagos can change the shape of birds beaks in a few generations, industrialization should make people better at desk jobs. And according to Gregory Clark, this has happened to Anglo-Saxons between the 1300s and the 1800s. [1] The same appears to have happened to Ashkenazi Jews and East Asians.[2] Keep in mind they, too, were once very disadvantaged in American society, but there's no keeping them down; both groups are richer than whites now, and had to contend with heavy discrimination on their way to riches. In fact, because of the belief all races should be equally represented, Asian students are heavily penalized in college admissions to make room for African Americans and Hispanics. [3] Finally, I wouldn't go so far as saying emigration eliminates gaps; emigrants aren't necessarily representative of a group, as they're the ones who are ambitious or desperate enough to want to leave. Mexican immigrants in the United States do not form an accurate cross-section of Mexican culture. Nigerian immigrants in United States have the highest rate of PhDs and Master degrees per capita [4], but that has a lot to do with immigration policies. It's a lot easier to get into the States with a Masters or a PhD, so there's selection at hand.
[1]http://www.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/clark_evol... [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_intelligence [3]http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&cd=1&url=h... [4]http://isteve.blogspot.com/2008/05/nigerians-are-most-educat...
[1]http://www.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/clark_evol... [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_intelligence [3]http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&cd=1&url=h... [4]http://isteve.blogspot.com/2008/05/nigerians-are-most-educat...
Why do you assume that the changes in the Galapagos occurred over "a few generations"? My understanding was that the separation occurred thousands of years ago.
If industrialization has been driving human evolution, it has probably not been in a positive direction. Fertility and IQ are negatively correlated in contemporary industrialized societies, so if anything, this would propel the opposite of the Flynn effect. The dark comedy Idiocracy is essentially about this.
If industrialization has been driving human evolution, it has probably not been in a positive direction. Fertility and IQ are negatively correlated in contemporary industrialized societies, so if anything, this would propel the opposite of the Flynn effect. The dark comedy Idiocracy is essentially about this.
The separation indeed occurred long ago, and the most dramatic evolutionary changes happened then. But the populations on the Galapagos continue to make observable evolutionary changes because of weather conditions.
http://www.nwf.org/nationalwildlife/article.cfm?issueID=115&...:
"Recently, the Grants witnessed another form of natural selection acting on the medium ground finch: competition from bigger, stronger cousins. In 1982, a third finch, the large ground finch, came to live on Daphne Major. The stout bills of these birds resemble the business end of a crescent wrench. Their arrival was the first such colonization recorded on the Galápagos in nearly a century of scientific observation. 'We realized,' Peter Grant says, 'we had a very unusual and potentially important event to follow.' For 20 years, the large ground finch coexisted with the medium ground finch, which shared the supply of large seeds with its bigger-billed relative. Then, in 2002 and 2003, another drought struck. None of the birds nested that year, and many died out. Medium ground finches with large bills, crowded out of feeding areas by the more powerful large ground finches, were hit particularly hard.
When wetter weather returned in 2004, and the finches nested again, the new generation of the medium ground finch was dominated by smaller birds with smaller bills, able to survive on smaller seeds. This situation, says Peter Grant, marked the first time that biologists have been able to follow the complete process of an evolutionary change due to competition between species and the strongest response to natural selection that he had seen in 33 years of tracking Galápagos finches."
I'm also aware of the negative correlation between IQ and Fertility; however, this is not without explanation. IQ correlates with k-strategy (bigger investments in fewer children that are slow to develop), and k-strategy correlates with having few children. [1] R-strategists have lower IQs and higher fertility rates. In the society outlined by Gregory Clark in his paper, wealth correlated with reproductive success. Right now, we live in an anomalous situation where food is not a limiting factor. But this is coming to an end; food prices have increased dramatically in recent years, with no sign of falling any time soon. This phenomenon is not new, and illustrates the possible advantages of r-selection.
From Clark's article: "The strength of the selection process through survival of the richest also seems to have varied depending on the circumstances of settled agrarian societies. Thus in the frontier conditions of New France (Quebec) in the seventeenth century where land was abundant, population densities low, and wages extremely high the group that reproduced most successfully was the poorest and the most illiterate."
http://www.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/Capitalism...
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K-selection
http://www.nwf.org/nationalwildlife/article.cfm?issueID=115&...:
"Recently, the Grants witnessed another form of natural selection acting on the medium ground finch: competition from bigger, stronger cousins. In 1982, a third finch, the large ground finch, came to live on Daphne Major. The stout bills of these birds resemble the business end of a crescent wrench. Their arrival was the first such colonization recorded on the Galápagos in nearly a century of scientific observation. 'We realized,' Peter Grant says, 'we had a very unusual and potentially important event to follow.' For 20 years, the large ground finch coexisted with the medium ground finch, which shared the supply of large seeds with its bigger-billed relative. Then, in 2002 and 2003, another drought struck. None of the birds nested that year, and many died out. Medium ground finches with large bills, crowded out of feeding areas by the more powerful large ground finches, were hit particularly hard.
When wetter weather returned in 2004, and the finches nested again, the new generation of the medium ground finch was dominated by smaller birds with smaller bills, able to survive on smaller seeds. This situation, says Peter Grant, marked the first time that biologists have been able to follow the complete process of an evolutionary change due to competition between species and the strongest response to natural selection that he had seen in 33 years of tracking Galápagos finches."
I'm also aware of the negative correlation between IQ and Fertility; however, this is not without explanation. IQ correlates with k-strategy (bigger investments in fewer children that are slow to develop), and k-strategy correlates with having few children. [1] R-strategists have lower IQs and higher fertility rates. In the society outlined by Gregory Clark in his paper, wealth correlated with reproductive success. Right now, we live in an anomalous situation where food is not a limiting factor. But this is coming to an end; food prices have increased dramatically in recent years, with no sign of falling any time soon. This phenomenon is not new, and illustrates the possible advantages of r-selection.
From Clark's article: "The strength of the selection process through survival of the richest also seems to have varied depending on the circumstances of settled agrarian societies. Thus in the frontier conditions of New France (Quebec) in the seventeenth century where land was abundant, population densities low, and wages extremely high the group that reproduced most successfully was the poorest and the most illiterate."
http://www.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/Capitalism...
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K-selection
>Frankly, I'm pretty sure that my barbaric, 7th-century European ancestors would have tested very poorly on any IQ test.
I'm not saying Europeans are or were inherently more intelligent or superior. I don't know about 7 AD, but definitely back in 7 BC my ancestors surely had as low an IQ as any group afflicted by this problem today, if not lower.
I'm not saying Europeans are or were inherently more intelligent or superior. I don't know about 7 AD, but definitely back in 7 BC my ancestors surely had as low an IQ as any group afflicted by this problem today, if not lower.
Men fall to the extremes of every pursuit. Even dressmaking, cooking, and interior design. Both testosterone and a greater likelihood of psychosis would account for this.
The article mentions 'Note that we are assuming that mathematical ability is normally distributed - we know the data fit this distribution around the mean but we don't know much about what happens at the very top.'
Which is precisely the thing being talked about. Why is this being voted up? The post isn't a relevant part of the discussion, and has little to no bearing on the articles it links to...
Which is precisely the thing being talked about. Why is this being voted up? The post isn't a relevant part of the discussion, and has little to no bearing on the articles it links to...
Generations from now our scholars will be lumped in the same category as alchemists and geocentrists---much to their discredit.
Don't you mean "our media"?
Larry Summers was effectively forced to step down by a large body of highly educated academics at Harvard that reacted emotionally to statistically accurate statements. The media didn't help though.
That is nonsense. Summers was forced to step down because he picked fights (on hiring/firing/promotions, spending priorities, the balance of power between different parts of the university, etc.) with the majority of the faculty, and forced out some wonderful and very popular members of the community. He tried to run the university like a CEO would run a corporation, and learned that a faculty made up of many of the the top scholars in every field isn’t easily pushed around. The public gaffes were just the icing on the cake.
Also, in being “forced to step down”, he was given a University Professorship: not the roughest of deals, to be sure.
Also, in being “forced to step down”, he was given a University Professorship: not the roughest of deals, to be sure.
Are you referring to Cornell West? My impression was that Cornell West was not bothering to show up for class and grade papers, and that Summers asked him to do the job he'd been hired to do. I guess that could make someone unpopular.
No, I’m not. However, “not bothering to show up for class and grade papers” is grossly inaccurate. Here’s a link to West’s radio interview with Tavis Smiley at the time: http://www.npr.org/programs/tavis/features/2002/jan/020107.w...
"In 2000 economist and former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers became president of Harvard. In a private meeting with West, Summers allegedly rebuked West for neglecting his scholarship, and spending too much time on his economically profitable projects.[5] Summers allegedly suggested that West produce an academic book befitting his professorial position. West had written several books, some of them widely cited, but his recent output consisted primarily of co-written and edited volumes. According to some reports, Summers also objected to West's production of a CD, the critically panned Sketches of My Culture, and to his political campaigning."
And
"In October, he had the temerity to meet with Cornel West and suggest that he turn his hand to some serious scholarship-West's most recent production was a rap CD called Sketches of My Culture-and lead the way in fighting the scandal of grade inflation at Harvard, where one of every two grades is an A or A-. What an outrage! West went to sulk in his tent, announcing on the way that he was applying for another year's leave of absence (he had just returned from one) and letting it be known that he might just up and leave Harvard."
To whom were you referring?
Edit: I accidentally misspelled the professor's name in my previous comment. He is, of course, Cornel and not Cornell.
And
"In October, he had the temerity to meet with Cornel West and suggest that he turn his hand to some serious scholarship-West's most recent production was a rap CD called Sketches of My Culture-and lead the way in fighting the scandal of grade inflation at Harvard, where one of every two grades is an A or A-. What an outrage! West went to sulk in his tent, announcing on the way that he was applying for another year's leave of absence (he had just returned from one) and letting it be known that he might just up and leave Harvard."
To whom were you referring?
Edit: I accidentally misspelled the professor's name in my previous comment. He is, of course, Cornel and not Cornell.
First: whoops, I edited my comment while you were replying. Second: Summers was clearly in the wrong at the beginning of his spat with West, who was at the time a University Professor (an extreme honor, which places a professor outside any department, and accords him the ability to teach whatever he likes); West’s outrage at Summers’ disrespect was predictable and easily avoidable.
There were several resignations of much-loved deans, &c. in the last couple of years of Summers’ presidency. Go read through the Crimson’s coverage of Summers’ departure if you want a reasonable semi-outsider’s (students aren’t party to internal faculty disputes) look.
Edit: that National Review article you quote is garbage: “The unpalatable truth is that Afro-American Studies is a pseudo-discipline—an academic ghetto constructed to accommodate the beneficiaries of ‘affirmative action’—and that the celebrated occupants of Harvard's department are second-class scholars with first-class salaries and perquisites.”
There were several resignations of much-loved deans, &c. in the last couple of years of Summers’ presidency. Go read through the Crimson’s coverage of Summers’ departure if you want a reasonable semi-outsider’s (students aren’t party to internal faculty disputes) look.
Edit: that National Review article you quote is garbage: “The unpalatable truth is that Afro-American Studies is a pseudo-discipline—an academic ghetto constructed to accommodate the beneficiaries of ‘affirmative action’—and that the celebrated occupants of Harvard's department are second-class scholars with first-class salaries and perquisites.”
What was summer wrong about? West was an embarrassment -- too busy writing a bad rap album to publish any actual work? It's not like they have accounting professors who are busy playing country music or death metal.
I hadn't heard about the other deans. I can understand Harvard professors being huffy when someone tries to make them behave differently, but that doesn't tell me it's wrong to ask -- it could be, but perhaps those professors were too egotistical or cozy. Very hard to say.
Is the National Review article factually incorrect? What parts of my life have been improved by the diligent and industrious researchers of the world's Afro-American Studies departments?
I hadn't heard about the other deans. I can understand Harvard professors being huffy when someone tries to make them behave differently, but that doesn't tell me it's wrong to ask -- it could be, but perhaps those professors were too egotistical or cozy. Very hard to say.
Is the National Review article factually incorrect? What parts of my life have been improved by the diligent and industrious researchers of the world's Afro-American Studies departments?
I don’t think we’ll get anywhere with this discussion—you have an existing prejudice about those involved which causes you to toss around trivializing sarcastic insults of Professor West (have you read any of his “actual” work?) and Harvard professors in general (“huffy”, “egotistical”, “cozy”? “behave differently?”).
And no, it’s not “factually incorrect”: it’s an opinion piece. It is, however, garbage.
And no, it’s not “factually incorrect”: it’s an opinion piece. It is, however, garbage.
It's more of a post-judice. I notice that in disputes with Larry Summers, Summers offers lots of data and the other side offers lots of emotion. I mean, the Big Stink over Summers was when he mentioned a fact about the standard deviations of test scores, and a professor in the audience swooned ("I would've either blacked out or thrown up.")
So yes, I think referring to the emotional aspect is important, here. People nail Summers for mentioning data they don't like -- which is probably why he gave up on academia and government and moved closer to finance.
I would like to know what about the article is garbage. My request for ways in which the legitimate field of Afro-American studies has improved my life still stands. If you can't discern a single logical or factual error in the entire National Review article, but you persist in, er, trashing it, shouldn't I just accept that you're reenacting the typical disagree-with-Larry pattern?
So yes, I think referring to the emotional aspect is important, here. People nail Summers for mentioning data they don't like -- which is probably why he gave up on academia and government and moved closer to finance.
I would like to know what about the article is garbage. My request for ways in which the legitimate field of Afro-American studies has improved my life still stands. If you can't discern a single logical or factual error in the entire National Review article, but you persist in, er, trashing it, shouldn't I just accept that you're reenacting the typical disagree-with-Larry pattern?
No, Summers was not canned because of his comments about women in science (at least that was not the primary reason; it certainly didn’t help him out). That was the whole point of this sub-thread. “People” didn’t nail Summers for mentioning data: that is a straw-man mischaracterization of any serious part of the dispute with Summers, even of the dispute about women in science. Summers did not give up on academia: he holds a University Professorship and teaches courses.
But more to the point, you are conflating three separate disputes, and trying to change the subject as a way to dodge my questions. But again, this discussion is going nowhere, and is therefore pointless.
As for the National Review article, it adds no substance, and makes no attempt to engage with any of the discussion it supposedly disagrees with, and instead makes a classic troll argument of empty epithets. It has no factual inaccuracies, because it not arguing facts. (Note: it does not take factual inaccuracies to make a stupid argument.) It is garbage, because the only possible reactions to reading it are “Yeah, they’re right. Those liberals are just useless elitist leeches on society,” or else “No, they’re wrong. Studying how society works is important,” neither of which is a worthwhile reaction (e.g., “Hey! That article taught me something I didn’t already know,” or “Wow! That article really clarified that concept I was having trouble understanding.”).
But more to the point, you are conflating three separate disputes, and trying to change the subject as a way to dodge my questions. But again, this discussion is going nowhere, and is therefore pointless.
As for the National Review article, it adds no substance, and makes no attempt to engage with any of the discussion it supposedly disagrees with, and instead makes a classic troll argument of empty epithets. It has no factual inaccuracies, because it not arguing facts. (Note: it does not take factual inaccuracies to make a stupid argument.) It is garbage, because the only possible reactions to reading it are “Yeah, they’re right. Those liberals are just useless elitist leeches on society,” or else “No, they’re wrong. Studying how society works is important,” neither of which is a worthwhile reaction (e.g., “Hey! That article taught me something I didn’t already know,” or “Wow! That article really clarified that concept I was having trouble understanding.”).
Summers tried to change a group of people that was extremely resistant to change. They tried to crucify him several times, and were finally successful.
You imply that the institution’s conservatism is undesirable, and that the faculty was unjustified in resisting Summers’ desired changes, but what qualifies you to make those judgments? Also, “tried to crucify him several times”?
Yup, they tried to get rid of him when he pushed out Cornel West, then they tried to get rid of him when he was about to fire FAS dean Kirby, and then they finally had their day when he made the gender commments.
I think this analysis of the situation is excellent:
http://www.uwgb.edu/DutchS/PSEUDOSC/Summers.HTM
The issue is one of variance, not mean. When social intelligence is included, I think the average woman is probably smarter than the average man, but men have more variance and are thus more prominent at the extremes.
I doubt that there is a strong genetic basis for this. It is probably due, in large part, to the ways boys and girls are raised. Speaking very broadly, and acknowledging the existence of counterexamples; boys are raised to be smart, while girls are raised to be social and cooperative. This means that gifted male children can more easily zip ahead in school, but that the stragglers fall further behind in academic and social skills... and are more likely to end up becoming criminals. A lot of girls feel guilty and insecure about being "too smart" compared to their peers, which holds them back.
I doubt that there is a strong genetic basis for this. It is probably due, in large part, to the ways boys and girls are raised. Speaking very broadly, and acknowledging the existence of counterexamples; boys are raised to be smart, while girls are raised to be social and cooperative. This means that gifted male children can more easily zip ahead in school, but that the stragglers fall further behind in academic and social skills... and are more likely to end up becoming criminals. A lot of girls feel guilty and insecure about being "too smart" compared to their peers, which holds them back.
The evidence in favor of cognitive differences across race and gender is enormous; in fact, it couldn't reasonably expected to be any greater. Hundreds of millions of standardized tests, tens of thousands of autopsies, brain scans, hormonal testing, etc. They all align. Not only that, but it's plain even to small children that not all humans were created equal. We're past the point of an emperor's new clothes dilemma; at this point, the emperor is butt-ass naked, trudging through snow, losing toes to frostbite, with big billboards of closeups of his genitals all over the place. I don't publicly call out the nakedness, but I'll at least avert my gaze.
[1] They'll say retarded because it will be the most appropriate term for something that is slow and stupid, and because they won't be chastised for saying it.