# Another Africa thread hijacked **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 1, 2011, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767 "2011-04-01T13:04:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 17
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/321 "2011-04-03T09:36:19Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > We already established that you do not want to check what Nature and others report. If what Nature has to say is so important, tell me in your own words. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/322 "2011-04-03T09:39:24Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As the Hoover Institution is a conservative group, I would think that it would support your\*\* fringe ideas\*\*. Alas. > > One feature of a **crackpot** is to think that their solutions would be followed just because of the reasons that they have. Name calling does not substitute for rational arguments. It indicates that the name caller is incapable of composing rational arguments. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/323 "2011-04-03T09:40:43Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > No one can possibly accuse Charles Murray, Arthur Jensen, and J. Philippe Rushton of being ignorant, but they are often accused of being racists. Those who claim that science does not support their conclusions need to explain why blacks tend to perform poorly on all the mental aptitude tests however they are designed, and why they tend to perform poorly in school and in jobs requiring superior intelligence. They need to explain why these facts about blacks are true everywhere, and always have been. Nah, as I have seen the problem is also that you think that those scientists will support you in all your conclusions and solutions. Do you have a cite that reports those scientists recommending that we drop NCLB? And once again, I do notice that you are in reality denying the bell curve, that shape is a big clue that not all have the issues that you are so keen to report. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/324 "2011-04-03T09:41:22Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Don’t know, but his article is barely mentioned or cited. > > Stephen Jay Gould continues to be cited by the thousands. That is because he tells people what they want to believe. What he cannot do is explain what nearly everyone knows to be true. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/325 "2011-04-03T09:44:15Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Name calling does not substitute for rational arguments. It indicates that the name caller is incapable of composing rational arguments. As anyone can notice you are still avoiding the Nature report and others, and this is the pit you numbskull, only an ignoramus would tell others that this is off limits here. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/326 "2011-04-03T09:45:18Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Nah, as I have seen the problem is also that you think that those scientists will support you in all your conclusions and solutions. Do you have a cite that reports those scientists recommending that we drop NCLB? I have already posted a news story by the Associated Press that says that No Child Left Behind is failing. Do I really need to re post it? ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/327 "2011-04-03T09:46:45Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As anyone can notice you are still avoiding the Nature report and others, and this is the pit you numbskull, only an ignoramus would tell others that this is off limits here. Here again you are resorting to shallow insults that say nothing about your intelligence or the validity or your arguments. Tell me what the Nature report says in your own words. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/328 "2011-04-03T09:47:34Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > That is because he tells people what they want to believe. What he cannot do is explain what nearly everyone knows to be true. It does not work like that. As an explanation of where I’m coming from is that this is almost a copy of what we see with the Intelligence Design debate. Sure, there are books and researchers that support their “theory” of race and intelligence, but what I see is not progress but stagnation in academia. There may be followups to the “research” and of the books published on this subject, but the important question is, **how influential they are and where**? So far, what I have seen is a repetition of the same ideas, from the same authors. But most important, one can notice an almost complete lack of support for the fringe solutions that the current crackpots here are proposing. In the case of intelligent design, Talk Origins demonstrated how silly the Intelligent Designers were for relying on the “classics” books published that supported ID. > **[Where exactly can I find this controversy again? | TalkDesign](http://www.talkdesign.org/cs/node/42/)** > [@](#): > > The best reason not to teach the “origins controversy” is that it simply is nowhere to be found. Genuine scientific controversies – the important and useful ones – take up a huge volume of space in the scientific literature. Even the controversies sparked by wrong ideas can be tracked as they generate discussion among the members of the scientific community. If no-one is talking about it, it’s not controversial. In essence, citation impact is a big deal, unless the crackpot supporters can show us that support for the “scientific” race research has increased or that the \*\*solutions \*\*they preach are actually a topic among the current experts, I think I have seen enough here to conclude that the crackpots here are just following the footsteps of the ID proponents, and the best they can do is keep the “controversy” alive. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/329 "2011-04-03T09:52:13Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Here again you are resorting to shallow insults that say nothing about your intelligence or the validity or your arguments. Tell me what the Nature report says in your own words. Must be the genes… 😛 Already mentioned in post #306, as it seems your limited intelligence did not allow you to read it completely. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/330 "2011-04-03T09:57:39Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > I have already posted a news story by the Associated Press that says that No Child Left Behind is failing. Do I really need to re post it? It is not just me that notices how cute he is in his incompetence? 🙂 That is not what I requested, can you post a cite from the scientists that you claim support your solutions were they also appear advocating for the same? ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/331 "2011-04-03T09:58:18Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Must be the genes… 😛 > > Already mentioned in post #306, as it seems your limited intelligence did not allow you to read it completely. I responded to #306 in #318. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/332 "2011-04-03T10:00:40Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > I responded to #306 in #318. No mention of what I concluded about what Nature said, megafail. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/333 "2011-04-03T10:03:25Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > No one can possibly accuse Charles Murray, Arthur Jensen, and J. Philippe Rushton of being ignorant, but they are often accused of being racists. Those who claim that science does not support their conclusions need to explain why blacks tend to perform poorly on all the mental aptitude tests however they are designed, and why they tend to perform poorly in school and in jobs requiring superior intelligence. They need to explain why these facts about blacks are true everywhere, and always have been. No, we don’t. All we have to do is cite that these people’s theories are considered crackpot theories amongst professionals. There were smart scientists who opposed Einstein’s theory of relativity. There still are some today, but we non-scientists only have to point out that most scientists say they are wrong. You know, I don’t find Chief Pedant’s theories offensive, except when he brings them up in places where they don’t belong. I have no problem with genetics playing a factor in intelligence, and different environmental pressures having shaped natural selection so that various groups of people are naturally more or less intelligent than others. Races do loosely correlate with ethnic ancestry, so it’s possible that, as unscientific as race is, there may be significant differences in intelligence in racial groups due to genetics. (The only problem is when you correlate it to the U.S., where we have racial mixing, which should override the original evolution pretty quickly.) The thing is, he admits that it’s just a wild theory, that isn’t considered correct by most people, and that he doesn’t actually have any proof. For him it is a hypothesis. The only times I find it offensive is when he forgets and acts like it’s established fact. You, NDD, treat the entire thing like established fact. You’ve admitted that you only keep harping on this because it riles people up. You disregard any cites that disagree with you as people intentionally trying to cover up the truth. You enjoy making people angry. You are a conspiracy-theorist race troll. It really bothers me that the wrong person is leaving. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/334 "2011-04-03T10:03:50Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > No mention of what I concluded about what Nature said, megafail. Why is it so difficult for you to convey this “Nature report” in your own words? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/335 "2011-04-03T10:09:13Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Why is it so difficult for you to convey this “Nature report” in your own words? This is truly sad, you really did miss this then, one just can not conclude otherwise based on your posts so far, once again, from post #306: [QUOTE=GIGObuster] The information showed that the crackpots indeed had not even a consensus to support their say so’s, and it was even more damming that in the recent _Nature_ point counter-point the side that was in favor of continuing to investigate this issue left clear that most of the research that prejudiced people twisted to use for their reprehensible “solutions” was discredited already. (And what is worse is that the linked piece was from the side \*\*supporting \*\* scientists to continue to investigate the differences of intelligence in societies, the piece with the most damming points against continuing to investigate this was not available for linking, but one can make an educated guess that it was devastating enough.) [/QUOTE] Notice that?\*\* The crackpots I’m referring to are not the scientists\*\*, but the ones that twisted their reports to be supportive of stupid ideas or solutions. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/336 "2011-04-03T10:19:05Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > This is truly sad, you really did miss this then, one just can not conclude otherwise based on your posts so far, once again, from post #306: Recent “sweeps” of the genome across human populations show that hundreds of genes have been changing during the last 5-10 millennia in response to local selection pressures. (See papers by Benjamin Voight, Scott Williamson, and Bruce Lahn). No new mental modules can be created from scratch in a few millennia, but slight tweaks to existing mechanisms can happen quickly, and small genetic changes can have big behavioral effects, as with those Russian foxes. We must therefore begin looking beyond the Pleistocene and turn our attention to the Holocene era as well – the last 10,000 years. This was the period after the spread of agriculture during which the pace of genetic change sped up in response to the enormous increase in the variety of ways that humans earned their living, formed larger coalitions, fought wars, and competed for resources and mates. The protective “wall” is about to come crashing down, and all sorts of uncomfortable claims are going to pour in. Skin color has no moral significance, but traits that led to Darwinian success in one of the many new niches and occupations of Holocene life — traits such as collectivism, clannishness, aggressiveness, docility, or the ability to delay gratification — are often seen as virtues or vices. Virtues are acquired slowly, by practice within a cultural context, but the discovery that there might be ethnically-linked genetic variations in the ease with which people can acquire specific virtues is — and this is my prediction — going to be a “game changing” scientific event. (By “ethnic” I mean any group of people who believe they share common descent, actually do share common descent, and that descent involved at least 500 years of a sustained selection pressure, such as sheep herding, rice farming, exposure to malaria, or a caste-based social order, which favored some heritable behavioral predispositions and not others.) **I believe that the “Bell Curve” wars of the 1990s, over race differences in intelligence, will seem genteel and short-lived compared to the coming arguments over ethnic differences in moralized traits.** I predict that this “war” will break out between 2012 and 2017. > [@GIGObuster](#): > > Diversity is not Determinism, I could not find determinism in the cites you brought here, and in the quote it is clear that they are indeed foreshadowing that the racists will attempt: to twist this for their purposes once again. The Nature Report substantiates my argument. Your response in #306 was to call anyone who disagreed with you “ignorant.” Ignorant of what? What don’t we know? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/337 "2011-04-03T10:30:13Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > **I believe that the “Bell Curve” wars of the 1990s, over race differences in intelligence, will seem genteel and short-lived compared to the coming arguments over ethnic differences in moralized traits.** I predict that this “war” will break out between 2012 and 2017. Must be the genes again, I don’t think those are your words. And the clear implication is that there was a war, and there was a winner. And I noticed before that what you have there is a researcher foreshadowing that racists and crackpots will once again twist research for their own sorry political points. > [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > The Nature Report substantiates my argument. Your response in #306 was to call anyone who disagreed with you “ignorant.” Ignorant of what? What don’t we know? Oh dear, you really did miss the other Nature cite that I posted then, try to keep up. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/338 "2011-04-03T11:39:13Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Make your pitch in an ATMB thread. > > Until I see some overwhelming support for removing the word “racist” from the category of insult, it stays there. > My basic criterion for insults is whether the use of the word will start a fight, disrupting Great Debates threads. However you want to spin the usage, I do not see its use failing to be disruptive. So for the sake of peace, you’re willing to let racists say completely horrible, insulting things about huge swathes of humanity, while anyone who wants to call that behavior by its proper name is hamstrung because the name is too insulting for delicate sensibilities. To put it in more specific terms: Poster A can say all day: Black people are too stupid for self rule, women need to know their place, and homosexuals are all pedophiles. Poster B cannot say: Poster A is a racist/sexist/homophobe; Poster A’s views are racist/sexist/homophobic. Do I have that right? If I do, then I believe this is a despicable rule. For the sake of peace you’re willing to let the most vile insulting shit spew forth from the mouths of certain posters while the decent people who are affected personally or viscerally by the insults aren’t even allowed the satisfaction in debate of calling that shit exactly what it is. You allow the shitheels free rein and force the decent people to shut their mouths or go elsewhere, all the in name of politeness and “open debate”. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/339 "2011-04-03T11:55:33Z")
If you want to pit someone, pit them. Otherwise you can’t call jerks on being jerks in GD. If you could, it’d be the pit. You can, I believe, point out that their _arguments_ are racist though. I think that should be allowed. ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2011, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767/340 "2011-04-03T12:02:41Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Oh dear, you really did miss the other Nature cite that I posted then, try to keep up. Your rhetorical points and insults are hardly worth keeping up with. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767.md?page=16) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-africa-thread-hijacked/576767.md?page=18)