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Comment by happytoexplain | Hacker News Reader

>Leftwingers who fervently oppose this kind of research seem to agree on one thing with neonazis: if we find such genetic differences, well, that would make racism fine.

What the fuck? I admit it doesn't come up very often, but every left-winger I personally know agrees that, even if you could pin a higher likelihood of bad behavior (say, violence) to a race via genetics, that still doesn't make discrimination ok, because the downsides, both practical and moral, of discrimination are just too big.

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I think the author is trying to make a point here, and this statement you quoted is not meant to be taken literally.

It's more like "the fact that left-wingers often oppose genetic research, taken at face value, implies that they fear that the results would make racism more acceptable" (since that's the only logical explanation if you assume that left-wingers otherwise fervently support science). Of course if you ask a "left-winger" directly if they think that, they would say "no, of course not". But then you could counter with "well then why are you so concerned about this type of research?".

I guess the only reasonable response that they could offer is "well, I don't want to give racists more fuel to push their agendas".

That's fine, I guess I understand where they are coming from. But should we really limit science to avoid giving fuel to racists? Doesn't it mean that the racists won, in some sense, if they successfully set back scientific research? Can't we get rid of racism without resorting to constraining scientific research? I sure hope we can.

IMO racists are generally not very intelligent, so I think we can best them even if they have a bit of extra fuel.

Author here. Your interpretation is about correct.

Then why do leftwingers generally insist with such intensity and aggression that different human populations have no psychological differences? To the point of attacking, ostracizing, and trying to ruin the life of anyone who even expresses uncertainty about this, or wonders about the question at all.

> Then why do leftwingers generally insist with such intensity and aggression that different human populations have no psychological differences?

In my life as a center-lefty who frequently associates with people much further to the left, I’ve never encountered any who insist this.

Leftists tend to be very skeptical of unsupported claims that particular outcome differences are due to such differences, especially when there is evidence of systematic inequality in treatment.

You're right. I miswrote. I will concede that leftwingers never insist on no intergroup differences. What actually happens is that the moment you even bring up the question, they go into "label and destroy" mode. Which means they call you names and focus on harming and silencing you. They never engage with the content of the discussion, unless you're good friends talking in private, so there's no need for them to insist on anything.

Please dont' try to deny the consequences at play here.

We live in an extremely heavily-policed overton window on these issues and there are serious consequences in play.

If you go and start asking, talking, and posting about e.g. IQ differences between races, it will seriously impact any career in tech, media, academia, law, education, and basically any other high-status field. It'll also seriously impact your social life in any city in America.

If you matter at all you'll also attract a cloud of motivated online harassers who will contact your employer, friends, spouse all trying to damage you as much as possible.

This is true even if you never make "unsupported claims that particular outcome differences are due to such differences". It's very easy to support such claims, since there's extremely strong evidence of a causal link from IQ to outcome differences, and there is similarly strong evidence that IQ is linked to group genetics.

And it's impossible to talk about IQ of population groups without people assuming you're making such claims about outcome differences, or putting those words in your mouth so they can come after you.

It seems relevant to point out that somebody flagged this article.

Hey, @dang, author here. I don’t think this deserves flagging! The topic is serious and worth thinking about.

Update: I don’t think you’re correct, however, that there is “strong evidence that IQ is linked to group genetics“. This is, for both scientific and political reasons, a very difficult area to work in, and I don’t believe the evidence is in to either support or rebut that claim.

> This is, for both scientific and political reasons, a very difficult area to work in, and I don’t believe the evidence is in to either support or rebut that claim.

The default position should be a heavy bias towards believing the genetic explanation is at least somewhat correct. Within group heritability may not directly imply between group heritability, but it makes it very likely. The left is too intellectually dishonest to admit that.

jlawson is correct, it's been basically game over for the strong environmentalist position since Lasker et al 2019.

Update: unflagged, thank you.

You can usually tell an article is garbage when it starts to make generalizations about "Leftwingers".

Your comment itself makes a generalization of similar caliber (about articles, not people, granted).

Your personal experience is odd to me because I have almost always found the opposite — leftists I know are comfortable with discrimination and in fact promote it.

Furthermore, it’s easy to see for yourself by going to a predominately Democrat city and then a Republican one — Generally, the Democrat city will be highly segregated by area and the Republican one will be highly integrated.

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