October 31, 2012
In other non-news, Arthur Jensen is still dead
And, according to Google News, nobody has mentioned it yet in the press.
Also in the non-news, the Google News search
has fallen from 5 articles to 4 this week.
"Racial differences in narcissistic tendencies"
From the Journal of Research in Personality:
Racial differences in narcissistic tendencies
Virgil Zeigler-Hill
Marion T. Wallace
Black individuals have been found to report the highest levels of self-esteem of any racial group in the United States. The purpose of the present research was to examine whether Black individuals also report higher levels of narcissism than White individuals. Study 1 (N = 367) found that Black individuals reported higher levels of narcissism than White individuals even when controlling for gender, self-esteem level, and socially desirable response tendencies. Study 2 (N = 967) and Study 3 (N = 315) found similar results such that Black individuals reported higher levels of narcissism than White individuals on the narcissism measures that captured less pathological facets of this construct. Study 3 also included indicators of psychological adjustment and found that the pathological aspects of narcissism were more strongly associated with maladjustment for Black individuals than for White individuals. The implications of these results for understanding the Black self-esteem advantage are discussed.
Liberal SWPL cities less attractive to blacks than conservative metro areas
From the Austin American-Statesman:
Austin struggling to recruit, retain black professionals
By Laylan Copelin
American-Statesman Staff
Central Texas is a fixture on national lists as one of the best places to live, work, start a business or retire. The region, according to its press clippings, is attractive whether you are young and single, gay or straight, or a retired couple.
But not necessarily if you are black.
“We’re on all those lists, but I’m not aware of Austin being on a list for African-Americans,” said Ashton Cumberbatch Jr., chairman of the Capital City African-American Chamber of Commerce. “Austin has never been marketed to blacks.”
Austin is, traditionally, the most liberal metropolitan area in Texas, and has long been fashionable among the nicer sort of white people. When I was at Rice in Houston way back in the 1970s, for example, everybody at Rice thought Austin was much better than Houston. (Austin has some hills to provide scenery, there are some German-Americans to provide civic cooperativeness, and the huge UT supports popular music and a little bit of film culture: Terence Malick and Mike Judge live there. Idiocracy was made in Austin, which you can take one of two ways.)
In general, however, all else being equal, blacks seem to prefer the less liberal burghs, such as Houston (which is home to the biggest West African community). The Atlanta region in Republican Georgia has become particularly attractive to educated African-Americans. If you were a black college graduate and wanted to raise your children amidst other black college graduates, Atlanta would be near the top of your list, not Austin.
"What's the Matter with White People?"
From The New Republic:
Why Democrats Need the White Working Class
Ruy Teixeira October 24, 2012 | 12:00 am
What’s the Matter with White People?: Why We Long for a Golden Age That Never Was
by Joan Walsh
Wiley, 278 pp., $25.95
WHAT’S THE MATTER with White People is really about what’s the matter with the white working class—more specifically, with the way they vote. Joan Walsh’s concern is with how the white working class has strayed from the New Deal coalition and from the Democrats. She explains and examines this thesis using her own experience: the political evolution of her New York working-class Irish Catholic family, most of whom followed the classic path from New-Deal-lunch-pail Democrats to Nixon-and-Reagan devotees.
Walsh is a more-or-less unreconstructed New Deal liberal who believes economic universalism is the glue that can and should hold the Democratic coalition together. ...
This brings us to the third and most distinctive part of Walsh’s argument: the role that Democrats, especially liberal Democrats, have played in alienating the white working class. In her view, the retreat of the white working class became an excuse for liberal Democrats to vilify this group, magnifying their shortcomings into a cartoon portrait of hopelessly racist and mean-spirited enemies of progress. This accelerated the white working class’s bitter departure from the Democrats. It also ensured that identity politics displaced class politics within the Democratic Party. As Walsh puts it: “I watched one area of common ground emerge on the left: more and more observers seemed to believe that so-called people of color … shared more interests with one another than with any white Americans.”
... Electoral weakness among the white working class can be finessed in some elections (2008, perhaps 2012), but it deprives the Democrats of the stable majority support they need around the country and within Congress to implement activist programs the country desperately needs. And if a Democratic administration runs into trouble, the potential for blowback from an unfriendly white working class is always present (as was seen in 2010).
Hank Aaron's career trajectory: The Juice or Old Man Game?
I got the term Old Man Game from a Tucker Max essay about when he used to play basketball as a U. of Chicago undergrad with law school lecturer Barack Obama. The 35ish Obama was surprisingly ineffectual. He looked good, but he hadn't developed much Old Man Game cunning that would help his teams win, so team captains who used a high pick on the tall, smart-looking black guy often wound up losing.
Developing Old Man Game is a helpful explanation for Hank Aaron's career path in baseball.
It was embarrassing for Major League Baseball back in 2007 when Barry Bonds broke the sainted Hank Aaron's career home run record, which Hank had famously taken in 1973 from Babe Ruth.
Developing Old Man Game is a helpful explanation for Hank Aaron's career path in baseball.
It was embarrassing for Major League Baseball back in 2007 when Barry Bonds broke the sainted Hank Aaron's career home run record, which Hank had famously taken in 1973 from Babe Ruth.
And, yet, Aaron's career path was a little strange, itself. He's was always seen in the press as second fiddle to Willie Mays, sometimes third fiddle to Willie and Frank Robinson. But he kept racking up homers as age took its toll on his rivals.
In Milwaukee, per 162 games from age 20 to 31: 124 singles, 36 doubles, 8 triples, 36 homers.
In Atlanta, per 162 games from age 32-40, 98 singles, 27 doubles, 3 triples, 43 homers.
The Atlanta ballpark is about 500 feet higher than Milwaukee's, and in general it was a better hitter's park.
So, it looks like Aaron simply craftily focused upon the aging ballplayer's remaining strength: strength. You can see in golfers that drive length declines only slowly as they age, while putting often goes quickly.
On the other hand, I'm not wholly convinced by the statistical evidence from before the Dianabol Age (1958 onward) that this idea that players will be able to up their homers per game numbers after age 31 by uppercutting is wholly clear. Now that I think about it, I have this circular suspicion that the notion that players can compensate for aging by trying harder to hit home runs comes from Late Aaron and was mostly used to explain Late Aaron.
Okay, Stan Musial went up from 25 to 29 per 162 games over those ages, so that supports it, but some of Musial's early seasons were played with the WWII ball that didn't go as far so he'd have a ton of doubles.
Babe Ruth went up from 43 to 51, but there were big changes in the ball; the 1918 ball was made out of old newspapers or something to Help the War Effort; after Roy Chapman got killed by a dirty ball he didn't see in 1920, they used newer cleaner balls and banned the spitter. Then they switched to a lively ball around 1925.
Lou Gehrig went from 37 up to 38 but died before he hit 40. Gehrig had some Old Man Game -- in 1927, Gehrig was like Aaron in 1959 or Musial in 1948, ripping huge line drives for a ton of extra bases (but not quite as many homers). But in the 1930s, Gehrig learned to pull the ball right down the short Yankee Stadium right field line for cheap homers. (Bill Dickey did, too.)
Johnny Mize from 30 to 32. Billie Williams from 28 to 29. Willie Stargell 33 to 36 when moving to a more homer friendly park. Hank Greenberg from 39 to 39, but retired young. Frank Howard 32 (mostly in cavernous Dodger Stadium) to 34. Joe Adcock 27 to 31. Jim Thome 40 and 40. Harold Baines 22 to 24. Frank Thomas 36 to 38. Barry Bonds from 35 to 53. Rafael Palmeiro from 26 to 40. Mark McGwire from 41 to 64. Sammy Sosa from 41 to 46. Luis Gonzales from 17 to 28 (with a peak of 57 at age 33). Gary Sheffield 32 to 34.
Babe Ruth went up from 43 to 51, but there were big changes in the ball; the 1918 ball was made out of old newspapers or something to Help the War Effort; after Roy Chapman got killed by a dirty ball he didn't see in 1920, they used newer cleaner balls and banned the spitter. Then they switched to a lively ball around 1925.
Lou Gehrig went from 37 up to 38 but died before he hit 40. Gehrig had some Old Man Game -- in 1927, Gehrig was like Aaron in 1959 or Musial in 1948, ripping huge line drives for a ton of extra bases (but not quite as many homers). But in the 1930s, Gehrig learned to pull the ball right down the short Yankee Stadium right field line for cheap homers. (Bill Dickey did, too.)
Johnny Mize from 30 to 32. Billie Williams from 28 to 29. Willie Stargell 33 to 36 when moving to a more homer friendly park. Hank Greenberg from 39 to 39, but retired young. Frank Howard 32 (mostly in cavernous Dodger Stadium) to 34. Joe Adcock 27 to 31. Jim Thome 40 and 40. Harold Baines 22 to 24. Frank Thomas 36 to 38. Barry Bonds from 35 to 53. Rafael Palmeiro from 26 to 40. Mark McGwire from 41 to 64. Sammy Sosa from 41 to 46. Luis Gonzales from 17 to 28 (with a peak of 57 at age 33). Gary Sheffield 32 to 34.
Ted Williams declined from 38 to 36. Mel Ott declined from 34 to 28. Frank Robinson declined from 37 to 30. Willie Mays declined from 40 to 35. Joe Dimaggio from 36 to 31. Willie Horton from 30 to 22. Ken Griffey Jr. from 42 to 32. Mike Schmidt from 38 to 36. Harmon Killibrew from 44 to 32. Ron Santo 27 to 18. Duke Snider from 36 to 21. Chuck Klein from 35 to 13. Al Kaline 27 to 21. Ernie Banks 40 to 25. Dick Allen from 35 to 27. Willie McCovey 37 to 30. Mickey Mantle 41 to 29. Eddie Matthews 38 to 25. Eddie Murray 30 to 25. Carl Yastrzemski 25 to 21. Reggie Jackson from 34 to 32. Alex Rodriguez 46 to 34. Manny Ramirez 41 to 37. Al Simmons 26 to 18. Brooks Robinson 17 to 14.
So, it looks like there are some legit examples of Old Man Game leading to more homers per game played, although it's hard to come up with anything completely trustworthy that's analogous to Aaron's trajectory. Overall, I'm inclined toward the Old Man Game explanation. But, still ...
October 30, 2012
The American Conservative symposium on Romney v. Obama
The whole gang at The American Conservative magazine, myself included, weighs in with their personal perspectives about the choice between Obama and Romney.
I've finally figured out who Obama really is
That headline is semi-serious: at this late date, I've come up with a sort-of-new theory on Obama. It's neither terribly scandalous nor laudatory (so nobody will pay attention to it); it just makes more sense out of some of the weird details in Obama's life story and puts his early career path in a historical perspective.
What's the matter with the Democrats?
Here is an article I wrote for The American Conservative in the summer of 2006 on the inherent weaknesses of the Democratic Party. As it turned out, the Democrats whomped the Republicans hard that November, but, still ... I think a lot of the points I made remain applicable.
That gets me to thinking: say, you are a self-interested foreigner -- such as, say, Carlos Slim, Vladimir Putin, Bibi Netanyahu, Prince Bandar, Ehud Barak, Lee Kwan Yew or some other formidable and well-informed gentleman -- and you had the opportunity to more or less buy either the Democrats or the Republicans, which would you choose? Say that there was a special offer, one time only: for $10 billion you could obtain discreet but effective control over either the Republicans or the Democrats for the next 10 years. Imagine that both are quietly for sale: which party would you buy? (Assume you have no loyalty or sympathy for either one, you are just looking for the best return on your investment.)
NBA team accused of discriminating against black basketball players
Business Insider reports:
The Minnesota Timberwolves go into the season with only five black players on their 15-man roster, and some people are calling it a conspiracy.
From Jerry Zgoda and Dennis Brackin of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune:
"How did we get a roster that resembles the 1955 Lakers?" asked Tyrone Terrell, chairman of St. Paul's African American leadership council. "I think everything is a strategy. Nothing happens by happenstance."
That strategy, Terrell and others in the black community believe, is to sell tickets to the Wolves' fan base, which is overwhelmingly white.
Lou Amundson, JJ Barea, Chase Budinger, Andrei Kirilenko, Kevin Love, Nikola Pekovic, Luke Ridnour, Ricky Rubio, Alexey Shved, and Greg Stiemsma make up 2/3 of the T-Wolves roster, and they are all white.
Minnesota civil rights activist Ron Edwards thinks something is up too, and he told the paper, "It raises some real questions to me about what's really intended. I think, personally, that it was calculated. Is this an attempt to get fans back in the stands? Minnesota, after all, is a pretty white state.''
I don't see much evidence at all that white Americans like foreign whites more than African-Americans, but it might someday happen. More likely, a small market team management might try a strategy of building a whiter team in the hopes of getting better team play interaction effects.
So far, the Timberwolves' Achilles heel (or anterior cruciate ligament, in the case of Ricky Rubio) has been injuries. Rubio, the former Spanish child prodigy point guard, has been out since the middle of last season, and Love, the closest thing to a white American superstar the NBA has at present (at least as measured by his huge points/rebounds numbers -- the rest of his game ...), recently broke his hand. So, we won't see if this strategy, if it is a strategy and not just randomness, works or not until the second half of the season.
One interesting study that I haven't seen done is differences in injury rates between races. I wouldn't be surprised if the prejudice against, say, white running backs in big time football might be based on a greater likelihood of white runners to get too dinged up to be effective.
Back in the 1980s, Bill James did a rare race study comparing white and black pairs of baseball players with similar rookie year number for speed-related stats such as triples, grounded into double plays, defensive range, and percent of time caught stealing. He found a strong tendency for black ballplayers to maintain their speed later into their careers than white players. I can't find James' essay online, but here is Jon Entine's summary of it.
Now, this analysis couldn't distinguish between the differential effects of injuries on speed and the differential effects of aging on speed, but it's still about the best starting point I've heard of.
Now, this analysis couldn't distinguish between the differential effects of injuries on speed and the differential effects of aging on speed, but it's still about the best starting point I've heard of.
For example, on paper, Oakland's Reggie Jackson and Bob Allison, a 1960s Minnesota Twin who was electrifying for a few years, looked equally fast as rookies, but Allison's speed fell off faster, while Reggie stayed fast enough to stay in the league long enough to put up Hall of Fame career numbers. James also cites Davey Lopes's then-amazing 1985 season with the Cubs as a 39 year old part-timer in which he stole 47 bases in 51 attempts.
You might think that somebody would have looked into this more over the quarter of a century since then, but sabermetrics appears pretty allergic to obvious racial analyses. With the gigantic obsession in 21st Century America with fantasy sports leagues, in which hobbyists draft lineups and compete with each other based on their players' subsequent stats, you would think this question would be a big one. Instead, though, stat analysts appear content to let racial stereotypes and hunches, rather than statistically informed analyses, drive fans' decision-making in this regard.
I wouldn't be surprised that black athletes have greater resilience to the wear-and-tear of injuries, but I can think of a couple of other explanations for James' results.
The first is that James' methodology of finding matching pairs might not be that good. Assume that the black bell curve of speed is shifted to the right of the white bell curve, but you have only crude measures of baseball speed. For example, Allison led the league in triples as rookie with 9, which is a good indicator of speed, but it's a small sample size. Some of the other stats, such as defensive range and caught stealing, are confounded by baseball savvy. Maybe white baseball players tend to be savvier as rookies, while blacks tended to be multi-sport athletes who only decided to concentrate upon baseball at a later age? (Certainly Reggie Jackson evolved into one of the more cunning ballplayers by late in his career, but he was a star football player in college.)
So, maybe Bob Allison was never quite the spectacular athlete that Reggie Jackson was, he just happened to have somewhat similar numbers based on not totally reliable measures. For example, James makes a big deal out of both guys being good college football players, but Allison was a fullback while Reggie was a defensive back. Big difference in likely speed. Perhaps white players who appear to be as fast as their matched black counterparts aren't really as fast on average, they're just the best that James' system can come up with. For example, I presume he didn't find any white matches for, say, Ricky Henderson, Willie Wilson, or Vince Coleman.
The second issue with the study is ... juicing. We don't know much about pre-Canseco experiments with steroids, but I'm developing some suspicions.
I saw Reggie Jackson's titanic homer in the 1971 All-Star Game off the light stand on top of the third deck in right field of Tiger Stadium. It was almost unprecedented, but by 30 years later it wasn't so amazing. Barry Bonds hit two similar blasts in the 2002 World Series that the TV cameraman couldn't track.
As he got older, Reggie developed the top-heavy look of a serious lifter that became common in 1990s baseball. California muscle building culture was way ahead of the rest of the country in technical sophistication in the 1960s and 1970s.
As he got older, Reggie developed the top-heavy look of a serious lifter that became common in 1990s baseball. California muscle building culture was way ahead of the rest of the country in technical sophistication in the 1960s and 1970s.
Or consider James's example of Davey Lopes.
I was a huge Los Angeles Dodgers fan during their strong 1970s, and I recall being at Dodger Stadium in the late 1970s when all the Dodger sluggers (the 1977 Dodgers was the first team with four 30-homer men) took a pregame jog through the outfield. They were men of average height, but extraordinarily wide.
Lopes was a leadoff man / second baseman whose career high in homeruns through age 31 was 10. Then he started developing more power and at age 34 in 1979 hit 28 homeruns, which seemed a bizarre total for a middle infielder at the time.
(Lopes' development, now that I think about it, had something to do with moving the outfield fences in at Dodger Stadium. In Sandy Koufax's 1960s, centerfield was 410 feet, then they brought it in to 400. The Dodgers had a lot of players who could hit minimal homers just over the outfielder's glove -- Ron Cey drove my Dodger-hating roommate crazy with a lot of cheap home runs that barely made it over the fence.) So, management then made the centerfield fence only 395'. Then MLB set a minimum of 400 in center, so they had to move it out again, but I don't remember the exact years.)
I'm just tossing some evidence out there, mind you, not drawing conclusions.
(Lopes' development, now that I think about it, had something to do with moving the outfield fences in at Dodger Stadium. In Sandy Koufax's 1960s, centerfield was 410 feet, then they brought it in to 400. The Dodgers had a lot of players who could hit minimal homers just over the outfielder's glove -- Ron Cey drove my Dodger-hating roommate crazy with a lot of cheap home runs that barely made it over the fence.) So, management then made the centerfield fence only 395'. Then MLB set a minimum of 400 in center, so they had to move it out again, but I don't remember the exact years.)
I'm just tossing some evidence out there, mind you, not drawing conclusions.
By the way, I only saw about a minute of the World Series, but I was happy to see that the Giants' young superstar catcher Buster Posey seemed to be built more like an old fashioned lithe athlete, in the mold of Roger Federer or Chris Paul, rather than a top-heavy 1990's slugger. Hope (and fandom) springs eternal ...
October 29, 2012
The world's most boring profound insight
Brain science reporter Benedict Carey has another good piece in the NYT:
That Guy Won? Why We Knew It All Along
By BENEDICT CAREY
The economy, “super PAC” money, debate performances, the candidates’ personalities. Roll it all together, and it’s obvious who’s going to win.
Or, uh, it will be.
Amid the many uncertainties of next Tuesday’s presidential election lies one sure thing: Many people will feel in their gut that they knew the result all along. Not only felt it coming, but swear they predicted it beforehand — remember? — and probably more than once.
These analysts won’t be hard to find. They will most likely include (in addition to news media pundits) neighbors, friends, co-workers and relatives, as well as the person whose reflection appears in the glare of the laptop screen. Most will also have a ready-made argument for why it was inevitable that Mitt Romney, or Barack Obama, won — displaying the sort of false, after-the-fact “foresight” that psychologists call hindsight bias.
“The important thing to know about hindsight bias is that it not only changes how you see the world, but also how you see yourself in it,” said Neal Roese, a professor of marketing at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, who just published a review paper on the bias with Kathleen D. Vohs of the University of Minnesota. “You begin to think: ‘Hey, I’m good. I’m really good at figuring out what’s going to happen.’ You begin to see outcomes as inevitable that were not.”
Long the province of political scientists, historians and pollsters, voters’ behavior has more recently attracted the attention of psychologists. They have dug into the field over the past decade or so, finding a wide-open arena in which to test results from lab studies and in some cases drawing interest from campaign strategists. If politics is individual psychology writ large, then thinking about politics should be subject to the same shortfalls and quirks as thinking about anything else. And so it is, to some extent — presenting some of the same opportunities for self-correction.
The most obvious carry-over to politics is confirmation bias, the reflexive instinct to begin with an assumption — say, that poor people are lazy — and notice only evidence that’s supportive, like malingering, ignoring the efforts of the rest of the $5-an-hour night cleaning crew.
Hindsight bias is close to the reverse. People retrofit their opinions and judgments to the evidence, in this case to an election result, but just as often to a political decision (or nondecision) that went wrong. Of course it was clear that Saddam Hussein was bluffing about weapons of mass destruction. Anyone could have seen that. Of course the consulate in Benghazi needed beefed-up security.
This combination of Confirmation Bias and Hindsight Bias means that people tend to come out, on net, pretty accurate in their perceptions.
Campaigns exploit this instinct, particularly when appealing to voters who second-guess decisions of someone they put in office, said Mark McKinnon, a former adviser to President George W. Bush and co-founder of No Labels, a nonprofit devoted to bipartisanship. “As the challenger, you need to win over some of those voters,” Mr. McKinnon said in an e-mail. “You need to give them an out for their ‘voters’ remorse.’ It’s not them, you see, it was him.”
Thank God for this bias. Otherwise, we'd be stuck with failed victors until they were finally term-limited out.
There is a lot of interest these days in flaws in perception and rationality. They gave Daniel Kahneman that quasi-Nobel in Economics for perpetrating a lot of old conjuror's tricks on his psych majors.
But the accurate prediction glass is part full as well as part empty. In fact, it's mostly full, it's just that nobody is very interested in predictions that are highly likely to be right.
Q. Which college is going to win the football national championship this year?
A. Probably not the team that gave Rick Sanchez an unpaid internship as a color announcer.
Well, that was boring.
In contrast, the Obama-Romney race is pretty exciting because it's hard to predict. The closer something is to a fifty-fifty tossup, the more exciting we find it.
But, as the odds approach 50-50 and excitement and controversy mounts, the return on genuine expertise diminishes. If the Big Event really is a coin flip, then any nimrod has as good of a chance of being right as the finest expert. (This is surprisingly little understood, in part because it's so much fun to make fun of experts. The reality is that what makes an expert an expert is that he's right most of the time about the stuff he ought to be right about, the boring stuff, but nobody can be right all that often about the exciting stuff that's fascinating to the public precisely because it is so uncertain.)
So, the penalties for not knowing what you are talking about when it comes to predicting exciting events are small. Thus, for instance, we see vast numbers of professional pundits getting all worked up over the Gender Gap in this election and few even mentioning the much larger Marriage Gap (as I noted in my current VDARE.com article, which you should definitely make sure to read. Trust me, I'm an expert.)
But, in the short run, so what? The nimrods have almost as much of a chance of being right about what will happen next Tuesday as the seers. Hence, why bother to learn how the world works, since the world is most interested in the outcomes of virtually unpredictable events?
On the other hand, in the long run, the boring, predictable stuff like the Marriage Gap really does matter. In fact, the more predictable it is, the more it matters.
In contrast, the Obama-Romney race is pretty exciting because it's hard to predict. The closer something is to a fifty-fifty tossup, the more exciting we find it.
But, as the odds approach 50-50 and excitement and controversy mounts, the return on genuine expertise diminishes. If the Big Event really is a coin flip, then any nimrod has as good of a chance of being right as the finest expert. (This is surprisingly little understood, in part because it's so much fun to make fun of experts. The reality is that what makes an expert an expert is that he's right most of the time about the stuff he ought to be right about, the boring stuff, but nobody can be right all that often about the exciting stuff that's fascinating to the public precisely because it is so uncertain.)
So, the penalties for not knowing what you are talking about when it comes to predicting exciting events are small. Thus, for instance, we see vast numbers of professional pundits getting all worked up over the Gender Gap in this election and few even mentioning the much larger Marriage Gap (as I noted in my current VDARE.com article, which you should definitely make sure to read. Trust me, I'm an expert.)
But, in the short run, so what? The nimrods have almost as much of a chance of being right about what will happen next Tuesday as the seers. Hence, why bother to learn how the world works, since the world is most interested in the outcomes of virtually unpredictable events?
On the other hand, in the long run, the boring, predictable stuff like the Marriage Gap really does matter. In fact, the more predictable it is, the more it matters.
The late, great scientist Arthur Jensen devoted his career to studying something that has turned out to be extremely predictable, but also so vastly important that his name appears to be unmentionable in the week after his death.
The Gap is closing!
Speaking of Arthur Jensen, Occidentalist has a table listing all 40 academic studies he could find of the white-black gap in average IQ in the U.S. They range from 1918, when it was measured at 17 points, to 2008, when it was found to be 16 points. So, don't let anybody tell you The Gap hasn't closed over the last 90 years.
Seriously, is there anything in the human sciences more stable than La Griffe's Fundamental Constant of American Sociology? It's really odd when you stop to think about how stable it has been. I suspect that differences in average height have changed significantly more over the generations. For example, when I was a kid, the Dutch weren't particularly tall, not the way they are now.
Things change.
Except this ...
Indeed, I'm wondering whether there isn't some kind of behavioral feedback at work regarding IQ that somehow keeps The Gap about the same. I don't have any candidates in mind for what that stabilizing mechanism might be, but it's worth considering.
Things change.
Except this ...
Indeed, I'm wondering whether there isn't some kind of behavioral feedback at work regarding IQ that somehow keeps The Gap about the same. I don't have any candidates in mind for what that stabilizing mechanism might be, but it's worth considering.
"Intelligence" on Arthur Jensen
A 1998 special edition of the scientific journal Intelligence, entitled "A King among Men: Arthur Jensen," was devoted to analyses by 13 leading experts of the career of the great psychometrician, who died last week at 89. Editor Douglas Detterman of Case Western Reserve University wrote:
"When I first met him personally, I wondered what his biases and prejudices really were and tried to identify them for many years. My effort was wasted. I finally came to the conclusion that he just doesn't have any. I think this may be a point that is impossible for his critics to understand. On the other hand, it is the very reason he has stood up so well against his critics. He has invested himself in pursuit of the truth, not any particular set of ideas. … He would gladly know the truth even if it proved him wrong."
"The Daily Mail" on Arthur Jensen
The most obvious impression a fair-minded observer derives from a sustained exposure to the work of the late Arthur R. Jensen (1923-2012), professor of psychology at Berkeley, is that Dr. Jensen was a man of the highest distinction, not just scientifically, but also morally.
Not surprisingly, this often drove the less, shall we say, morally distinguished into paroxysms of rage. From the Daily Mail:
IS THIS MAN TRULY THE WORLD'S MOST LOATHSOME SCIENTIST?
Daily Mail (London)
September 17, 1999 | Copyright
Byline: MARY RIDDELL
TODAY, American eugenics professor Arthur Jensen addresses a gathering of academics in London. The Daily Mail does not agree with his views on intelligence indeed, we profoundly disagree with them. However, we feel that open debate is the best way of establishing the truth and that our readers are quite capable of drawing their own conclusions.
FOR three decades, Professor Arthur Jensen has lived in the shadow of death and violence.
It is difficult, however, to feel sorrow for him. In Australia, he was extricated from a baying mob by 100 police officers.
In Germany, warnings were issued that if he were allowed to lecture he might not leave the stage alive.
On his own university campus, at Berkeley, California, he was, at the height of his vilification, protected against those who threatened to kill him by armed bodyguards.
His car tyres were slashed and his door was sprayed with swastikas by his own students, who gathered in the corridor to hiss as he walked by.
This week, to little fanfare, the world's most demonised scientist arrived in London, where he once learned his theories and where he will deliver the keynote address today at a conference devoted to eugenics, or the enhancement of the human race.
To his supporters, Jensen - an Emeritus Professor of Educational Psychology possesses one of the finest scientific minds of our time, worthy of a Nobel Prize.
To his countless opponents, of whom President Bill Clinton is one, he is a dabbler in the unthinkable.
Sadly, the world will never be treated to a Jensen - Clinton debate ...
More on Arthur Jensen, 1923-2012
Here's my 2002 review in VDARE.com of Intelligence, Race, and Genetics: Conversations with Arthur R. Jensen, in which the brilliant interviewer Frank Miele leads the Berkeley psychologist through an accessible tour of his work.
Here's Jensen's 1982 review, "The Debunking of Scientific Fossils and Straw Persons," of Steven Jay Gould's bestseller The Mismeasure of Man.
Here's the big 2005 paper Jensen co-authored with J.P. Rushton: "Thirty Years of Research on Race Differences in Cognitive Ability."
Any other suggestions for online materials?
Update: Mike Steinberg suggests:
Jensen comes in 47th place in "The 100 Most Eminent Psychologists of the 20th Century" Review of General Psychology, 2002, 6, 139-152.
Review: The Scientific Study of General Intelligence. Tribute to Arthur R. Jensen; H. Nyborg (ed.). Pergamon, London, 2003, pp.642
The Scientific Study of General Intelligence: Tribute to Arthur Jensen edited by Helmuth Nyborg - google books
Gottfredson, L. S. 2003). g, jobs, and life. In H. Nyborg (Ed.), The scientific study of general intelligence: Tribute to Arthur R. Jensen (pp. 293-342). New York: Pergamon.
Gottfredson, L. S. (1998). Jensen, Jensenism, and the sociology of intelligence. Intelligence, 26(3), 291-299.
Chapter 12 entitled Population differences in Intelligence: Causal Hypotheses from the book The g factor: The Science of Mental Ability
You can download the 1998 issue of Intelligence devoted to Jensen's career here. (You'll then need to open the compressed file with an unzipping application.)
Here's the big 2005 paper Jensen co-authored with J.P. Rushton: "Thirty Years of Research on Race Differences in Cognitive Ability."
Any other suggestions for online materials?
Update: Mike Steinberg suggests:
Jensen comes in 47th place in "The 100 Most Eminent Psychologists of the 20th Century" Review of General Psychology, 2002, 6, 139-152.
Review: The Scientific Study of General Intelligence. Tribute to Arthur R. Jensen; H. Nyborg (ed.). Pergamon, London, 2003, pp.642
The Scientific Study of General Intelligence: Tribute to Arthur Jensen edited by Helmuth Nyborg - google books
Gottfredson, L. S. 2003). g, jobs, and life. In H. Nyborg (Ed.), The scientific study of general intelligence: Tribute to Arthur R. Jensen (pp. 293-342). New York: Pergamon.
Gottfredson, L. S. (1998). Jensen, Jensenism, and the sociology of intelligence. Intelligence, 26(3), 291-299.
Chapter 12 entitled Population differences in Intelligence: Causal Hypotheses from the book The g factor: The Science of Mental Ability
You can download the 1998 issue of Intelligence devoted to Jensen's career here. (You'll then need to open the compressed file with an unzipping application.)
Why the media hype over the gender gap is silly
Here's a graph from my new VDARE.com article demonstrating why all the hubbub over Romney's "gender gap" ought to be small potatoes compared to Obama's seldom discussed "marriage gap."
Read the whole thing there.
October 28, 2012
The Gender Gap v. the Marriage Gap and Obama's Fringe v. Romney's Core
Over at VDARE.com, I have a sizable new article that begins by comparing the infinitely discussed Gender Gap in the 2012 election to the much larger but barely mentioned Marriage Gap, and then goes on from that example to propose a reductionist theory of the identity politics of the entire election. It has two graphs that show the demographics of the upcoming vote (i.e., who is voting for whom) in some detail. I think you'll find it interesting. It's much like an exit poll analysis, only done before the election.
It always seems like a good idea to present data graphically, but always ends up taking quite a few hours per graph to do them right. I think these finally came out worth the effort.
It always seems like a good idea to present data graphically, but always ends up taking quite a few hours per graph to do them right. I think these finally came out worth the effort.
Hurricane Sandy precaution prediction
You should go buy plywood and nail it over your TV screen unless you are in the mood to see a lot of retrospectives in the media on the last Republican President's failure regarding Hurricane Katrina.
Ben Franklin: "Britain was formerly the America of the Germans"
For those interested in questions of deep ethnic roots, discuss.
Note: Franklin used this device to make a topical political point in favor of American liberties in the colonists' dispute with the British crown. Yet, the image is arresting from a cultural point of view as well.
Obama defeat excuses are currently being auditioned
From Minnesota Public Radio:
Poll: Majority of Americans are racist
Posted at 9:11 AM on October 27, 2012 by Bob Collins
It's a stunning poll that the Associated Press released today on one of the most invisible news days of the week. More than half of all Americans have negative attitudes toward African Americans, it says.
Though it's within the margin of error of a similar poll in 2008, it confirms there is no such thing as post-racial America.
"As much as we'd hope the impact of race would decline over time ... it appears the impact of anti-black sentiment on voting is about the same as it was four years ago," Jon Krosnick, a Stanford University professor, told the AP. He worked with the news organization to develop the survey.
Fifty-one percent of Americans express explicit anti-black attitudes, it says. About 52 percent have anti-Hispanic attitudes.
“It’s really a matter of some people just not trying hard enough; if Blacks would only try harder, they could be just as well off as whites.”
If you are white, the correct to this question is ... well, there is no correct answer.
For example, only 5% of respondents agree that the term "law-abiding" describes blacks "extremely well" compared to 7% who agree "law-abiding" describes whites "extremely well.
For example, only 5% of respondents agree that the term "law-abiding" describes blacks "extremely well" compared to 7% who agree "law-abiding" describes whites "extremely well.
That's racist!
In these lengthy reports, the racial breakdowns on racial attitudes are not broken out, unsurprisingly.
October 26, 2012
To defeat Obama, oilman T. Boone Pickens donates one ... MILLION ... dollars!
The Washington Post is up in arms:
The Swift Boaters are back for 2012
Posted by Dan Eggen at 02:43 AM ET, 10/26/2012
The Swift Boat crew is back for another election.
Many of the top donors to a group that funded controversial attacks on the military career of Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in the 2004 presidential race are now heavily funding a super PAC targeting President Obama, new records show.
American Crossroads, a super PAC backed by former George W. Bush adviser Karl Rove, received $6 million in October from the key backers of the earlier effort against Kerry, according to disclosures filed late Thursday. Dallas billionaire Harold Simmons gave $4 million; Houston homebuilder Bob J. Perry gave $1 million; and Dallas financier T. Boone Pickens chipped in another $1 million. ...
Pickens had not previously given to the Rove group ...
According to Wikipedia, T. Boone promised one ... million ... dollars in the 2004 election for proof tarnishing John Kerry's military record, but didn't pay up.
On the other hand, it also says, he has now donated $265 million to Oklahoma State athletics. (That's $100 million more than the last time I checked.)
But, Oklahoma State's football team is only ranked 33rd in the country at the moment, so I guess T. Boone's attention is wandering back to politics.
If Karl Rove were the machiavellian genius everybody claims, he'd figure out a way to covertly get rich liberals more interested in college football.
For example, UCLA football could be a bottomless pit for Hollywood heterosexuals to toss their millions into.
Why should UCLA have to play home games 30 miles away in WASPy Pasadena? Why should Boone Pickens Stadium be so much better than what we've got? What UCLA needs is a billion dollar Jackie Robinson Brooklyn Dodgers Stadium (to be named after the UCLA football player who integrated baseball in 1947 by joining the Brooklyn Dodgers).
What? Are you against Jackie Robinson? Are you against the Brooklyn Dodgers? We in the Industry need to stick it to the red state racists by building the world's finest college football stadium and doing whatever it takes to recruit a national championship team to play in it! Whatever it takes ...
Haim Saban spends a certain number of millions per year to make sure he has a say in who gets to be Secretary of State. It's pretty easy to do: you give some money to the Brookings Institution for a Middle Eastern think tank, you give some to the DNC, and so forth and so on. Not that many rich guys care about who is Secretary of State compared to number who care about who wins the BCS. So what if Saban got obsessed with improving the Bruin's porous secondary? Fixing that would take real money.
Pinker takes a crack at explaining red v. blue states
Steven Pinker takes a crack at explaining the red state - blue state map:
But while these theories help explain why the seemingly diverse convictions within the right-wing and left-wing mind-sets hang together, they don’t explain why they are tied to geography. The historian David Hackett Fischer traces the divide back to the British settlers of colonial America. The North was largely settled by English farmers, the inland South by Scots-Irish herders. Anthropologists have long noted that societies that herd livestock in rugged terrain tend to develop a “culture of honor.” Since their wealth has feet and can be stolen in an eye blink, they are forced to deter rustlers by cultivating a hair-trigger for violent retaliation against any trespass or insult that probes their resolve. Farmers can afford to be less belligerent because it is harder to steal their land out from under them, particularly in territories within the reach of law enforcement. As the settlers moved westward, they took their respective cultures with them. The psychologist Richard Nisbett has shown that Southerners today continue to manifest a culture of honor which legitimizes violent retaliation. ... Admittedly, it’s hard to believe that today’s Southerners and Westerners carry a cultural memory of sheepherding ancestors. But it may not be the herding profession itself that nurtures a culture of honor so much as living in anarchy.
You can't talk about why the South today has a lot of white solidarity centering around the Republican Party and the North does not without talking about the, uh, Canadian border.
Pinker's Massachusetts is 6 percent black, so what's the worst that could happen if the Democrats control the statehouse? A bunch of white Democratic politicians will just steal billions more on the next Big Dig. But, eventually, it will get dug. Every so often the white people of Massachusetts elect a Mitt Romney to cut down on the thieving by white Democrats, but it's really not that big of a deal.
Mississippi is 37 percent black, so what's the worst that could happen if the Democrats control the statehouse? Well, blacks will make up the majority of the Democrats, so ... Detroit, Gary, East St. Louis. Not surprisingly, almost all the white people in Mississippi make sure to vote Republican.
You can see the same white solidarity in liberal cities like New York and Chicago in mayor's races. Blacks went one and done in the New York's mayor's office and the Democrats are 0 for 5 in NYC ever since. But New Yorkers will vote overwhelmingly for Obama next month because that's not a real important job like Mayor is, so they can afford to make symbolic gestures of racial enlightenment at the national level.
(Something that's worth bringing up here is that for a few decades now, better educated blacks have been voting with their feet to move away from liberal Northern states to the white-run state of Georgia. That was background for Tom Wolfe's 1990s Atlanta book A Man in Full. Blacks get a small city to run at the center of a vast white-dominated conurbation in a Republican-dominated state, and despite not unexpected problems, the system works fairly well. There's a general pattern that white conservative states like Georgia and Texas tend to be better for blacks and Latinos than white liberal states, which is, in the long run, a very big problem for Republicans: when Republicans are successful at doing what they want to do, such as encouraging building jobs and houses, their success attracts non-Republicans.)
Anyway, there are other reasons red states are red and blue states are blue, as well, such as the dirt gap. A large number of red states are in the upper Louisiana Purchase and surrounding areas and are mostly white. Some are extremely orderly and nonviolent, such as Utah, and others are not. Land availability is the big issue driving them red.
Social psychologists are conformist and discriminatory
I'm not exactly sure what social psychologists do. (Their work doesn't come up all that much in intellectually lively circles.) Search out evidence of conformity and discrimination, I guess. So, as you would expect from the Law of Projection, it turns out that social psychologists are so conformist and discriminatory themselves that I can barely stay awake to finish typing this sentence about them. From Perspectives on Psychological Science:
Political Diversity in Social and Personality Psychology
Yoel Inbar and Joris Lammers
Tilburg University
Abstract
A lack of political diversity in psychology is said to lead to a number of pernicious outcomes, including biased research and active discrimination against conservatives. The authors of this study surveyed a large number (combined N = 800) of social and personality psychologists and discovered several interesting facts. First, although only 6% described themselves as conservative “overall,” there was more diversity of political opinion on economic issues and foreign policy. Second, respondents significantly underestimated the proportion of conservatives among their colleagues. Third, conservatives fear negative consequences of revealing their political beliefs to their colleagues. Finally, they are right to do so: In decisions ranging from paper reviews to hiring, many social and personality psychologists said that they would discriminate against openly conservative colleagues. The more liberal respondents were, the more they said they would discriminate.
Lee Jussim of Rutgers offers an amusing parody of "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack" in regard to Liberal Privilege in academia.
One of Robert Conquest's three laws of politics is "Everyone is conservative about what he knows best." Social psychologists must not know best about much.
October 25, 2012
Historian Jacques Barzun, age 104, RIP
Franco-American historian Jacques Barzun has died in San Antonio at 104. He could recall the sound of the Big Bertha cannon shelling Paris, and met as a child many of the cultural luminaries of the pre-Great War age.
In his 2000 bestseller From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present, published when he was 92, Barzun suddenly stopped on p. 654-656 to briefly discuss what he's learned from a lifetime of learning:
"... history cannot be a science; it is the very opposite, in that its interest resides in the particulars."
Still, he goes on to list a dozen "generalities" to show "how scanning the last five centuries in the West impresses on the mind certain types of order." Here are five of them (I'll leave it to you to fill in examples):
- An age (a shorter span within an era) is unified by one or two pressing needs, not by the proposed remedies, which are many and thus divide.
- A movement in thought or art produces its best work during the uphill fight to oust the enemy; that is, the previous thought or art. Victory brings on imitation and ultimately Boredom.
- "An Age of --" (fill in: Reason, Faith, Science, Absolutism, Democracy, Anxiety, Communication) is always a misnomer because insufficient, except perhaps "An Age of Troubles," which fits every age in varying degrees.
- The historian does not isolate causes, which defy sorting out even in the natural world; he describes conditions that he judges relevant, adding occasionally an estimate of their relevant strength.
- The potent writings that helped to reshape minds and institutions in the West have done so through a formula or two, not always consistent with the text. Partisans and scholars start to read the book with care after it has done its work.
A short, stylized dialogue on epigenetics
Me: If you analyze a host of real world outcomes using adoption studies, fraternal v. identical twin studies, twins-raised-apart studies, the history of early childhood intervention research, naturally-occurring experiments, differences between societies, changes over history, and so forth, you tend to come up with nature and nurture as being about equally important: maybe fifty-fifty. The glass is roughly half-full and half-empty.
The Latest Conventional Wisdom: You are so out of date! You see, the new science of epigenetics has proven that genes are even more powerful than you think. It's really three-fourths genes. But, the study of epigenetics also proves that one-third of the power of genes is under control of the environment!
Me: Okay, but that's what I just said: fifty-fifty. Two-thirds of three-quarters is one-half. I mean, whatever the precise mechanism under the hood, it's got to translate into what we see where the rubber hits the road, which is about fifty-fifty nature and nurture.
The Latest Conventional Wisdom: Whatever. Your fuzzy math can hardly shake my faith in the TED talk I saw about epigenetics or that article in the NYT Magazine. Where are your Powerpoints, huh? Where is your heartwarming example of a poor child winning a chess tournament due to epigenetics? Where is your galvanizing anecdote about how epigenetics caused Bob Dylan to write Like a Rolling Stone?
Dr. Betty Hart, RIP: Scientifically proved blacks don't talk enough or watch TV enough
From the NYT:
Betty Hart Dies at 85; Studied Disparities in Children’s Vocabulary Growth
By WILLIAM YARDLEY
Published: October 25, 2012
Betty Hart, whose research documenting how poor, working-class and professional parents speak to their young children helped establish the critical role that communicating with babies and toddlers has in their later development, died on Sept. 28 in hospice care in Tucson. She was 85 ....
Dr. Hart was a graduate student at the University of Kansas in the 1960s when she began trying to help poor preschool children overcome speech and vocabulary deficits. But she and her colleagues later concluded that they had started too late in the children’s lives — that the ones they were trying to help could not simply “catch up” with extra intervention.
At the time, a prevalent view was that poor children were essentially beyond help, victims of circumstances and genetics. But Dr. Hart and some of her colleagues suspected otherwise and revisited the issue in the early 1980s, beginning research that would continue for a decade.
“Rather than concede to the unmalleable forces of heredity, we decided that we would undertake research that would allow us to understand the disparate developmental trajectories we saw,” she and her former graduate supervisor, Todd R. Risley, wrote in 1995 in “Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young American Children,” a book about their findings, which were reported in 1992. “We realized that if we were to understand how and when differences in developmental trajectories began, we needed to see what was happening to children at home at the very beginning of their vocabulary growth.”
They began a two-and-a-half-year study of 42 families of various socioeconomic levels who had very young children. Starting when the children were between 7 and 9 months old, they recorded every word and utterance spoken to them and by them, as well as every parent-child interaction, over the course of one hour every month.
It took many more years to transcribe and analyze the data, and the researchers were astonished by what they eventually found.
“Simply in words heard, the average child on welfare was having half as much experience per hour (616 words per hour) as the average working-class child (1,251 words per hour) and less than one-third that of the average child in a professional family (2,153 words per hour),” Drs. Hart and Risley wrote.
“By age 4, the average child in a welfare family might have 13 million fewer words of cumulative experience than the average child in a working-class family,” they added.
Isn't there a giant assumption in this famous calculation: that the one hour per month of child-parent interactions that Hart & Risley recorded are representative of the entire month? Don't some of these non-welfare parents have jobs, during which periods they can't be talking to their children?
Let's try the math. Say the average 0 to 4 year old is awake 10 hours per day, or 3,600 hours per year, or 14,400 hours in those four years. If the working class family talks at the child 635 more words per hour than those famously laconic welfare families, then that comes out to a differential of 9,144,000 words, not 13,000,000 words. So the working class family must be talking at their children not just ten hours per day, but more like 14 hours per day, leaving only 10 hours per day for the poor child to sleep (or to talk himself or to watch TV or to play with his blocks or to watch the cat or to daydream).
Shouldn't somebody call Child Protective Services and report all the non-welfare families in the country for child abuse due to incessant chatter?
They also found disparities in tone, in positive and negative feedback, and in other areas — and that the disparities in speech and vocabulary acquisition persisted into school years and affected overall educational development.
So, parents with big vocabularies tended to have children with big vocabularies. (Also, I would imagine, parental skin tone, height, and hair color tended to correlate with their children's skin tone, height, and hair color.)
“People kept thinking, ‘Oh, we can catch kids up later,’ and her big message was to start young and make sure the environment for young children is really rich in language,” said Dr. Walker, an associate research professor at Kansas who worked with Dr. Hart and followed many of the children into their school years.
I recommend taking your preschoolers to Tom Stoppard plays. Start with The Real Thing no later than 30 months and work up to Arcadia by at least the fourth birthday. Also, read to them every night from Nabokov. Pnin is an easy start, but they should be finished with Ada by the time they enter kindergarten.
The work has become a touchstone in debates over education policy, including what kind of investments governments should make in early intervention programs. One nonprofit program whose goals are rooted in the findings is Reach Out and Read, which uses pediatric exam rooms to promote literacy for lower-income children beginning at 6 months old.
Prompted by the success of Reach Out and Read, Dr. Alan L. Mendelsohn, a developmental-behavioral pediatrician at Bellevue Hospital and New York University Langone Medical Center, pushed intervention even further. He created a program through Bellevue in which lower-income parents visiting doctors are filmed interacting and reading with their children and then given suggestions on how they can expand their speaking and interactions.
“Hart and Risley’s work really informed for me and many others the idea that maybe you could bridge the gap,” Dr. Mendelsohn said, “or in jargon terms — address the disparities.” ...
I don't see any mention here of experimental research, just tracking of existing differences that are compatible with most combinations of nature and nurture theories.
“Today, much of her research is being applied in many different ways,” said Dr. Andrew Garner, the chairman of a work group on early brain and child development for the American Academy of Pediatrics. “I think you could also argue that the current interest in brain development and epigenetics reinforces at almost a molecular level what she had identified 20 years ago.”
Epigenetics!
One obvious but little mentioned implication of this popular line of thought is: White professional mothers who hire semi-literate nannies who have smaller vocabularies in English than in Spanish and smaller vocabularies in Spanish than in Mayan to raise their children for them while they put in the hours to make partner or get tenure are dooming their offspring to only getting into State U. You see, by not personally speaking to their small children for much of the day using their high level vocabularies, Hart & Risley's logic says their kids are in big, big trouble.
And, indeed, many white mothers behave exactly as if this were true.
For example, one of my early bosses in the marketing research business was Kathie, a hard-charging, funny, foul-mouthed MBA who let nothing stand in the way of our team making the numbers. Then I heard a rumor that she and her boyfriend, an MBA at a big corporation, were going to take a little time off from each other. Then she started going to the gym at lunchtime, lost ten pounds, and then showed up one Monday morning wearing an engagement ring and a big smile: her ex-boyfriend was now going to be her husband. Marriage and a baby ensued, but she was right back on the job a month after giving birth. Then she got pregnant again, and came back to the job a couple of months after giving birth. But within a week of her return, she announced she was permanently retiring to be a housewife. Management tried hard to talk her into part-time work or taking just a couple of years off or whatever she wanted, but she was adamant that she was done with working: she was a full-time mom from now on.
Of course, Kathie's trajectory was feasible because her husband was making good money. But, her emotions are common.
Of course, this pro stay-at-home-mom implication of the Hart & Risley conventional wisdom is not played up in the press, which is largely run by women who are not stay-at-home-moms and who frequently feel guilty about it if they do have children or resent those women who are mothers, and thus try to put them down by emphasizing how glamorous and politically important it is to be a working woman.
What does the research say on stay-at-home mothers vs working mothers in terms of children's cognitive development? I haven't looked in a long time, but my recollection was that it's inherently uncertain because nobody can run a controlled experiment. Mothers are constantly adapting to what they think is best for their children (e.g., Kathie), trying to optimize a variety of factors that differs for each family and, indeed, for each child.
That moms refuse to follow experimental methodologies when it comes to their own kids is bad for science, but good for children.
One obvious but little mentioned implication of this popular line of thought is: White professional mothers who hire semi-literate nannies who have smaller vocabularies in English than in Spanish and smaller vocabularies in Spanish than in Mayan to raise their children for them while they put in the hours to make partner or get tenure are dooming their offspring to only getting into State U. You see, by not personally speaking to their small children for much of the day using their high level vocabularies, Hart & Risley's logic says their kids are in big, big trouble.
And, indeed, many white mothers behave exactly as if this were true.
For example, one of my early bosses in the marketing research business was Kathie, a hard-charging, funny, foul-mouthed MBA who let nothing stand in the way of our team making the numbers. Then I heard a rumor that she and her boyfriend, an MBA at a big corporation, were going to take a little time off from each other. Then she started going to the gym at lunchtime, lost ten pounds, and then showed up one Monday morning wearing an engagement ring and a big smile: her ex-boyfriend was now going to be her husband. Marriage and a baby ensued, but she was right back on the job a month after giving birth. Then she got pregnant again, and came back to the job a couple of months after giving birth. But within a week of her return, she announced she was permanently retiring to be a housewife. Management tried hard to talk her into part-time work or taking just a couple of years off or whatever she wanted, but she was adamant that she was done with working: she was a full-time mom from now on.
Of course, Kathie's trajectory was feasible because her husband was making good money. But, her emotions are common.
Of course, this pro stay-at-home-mom implication of the Hart & Risley conventional wisdom is not played up in the press, which is largely run by women who are not stay-at-home-moms and who frequently feel guilty about it if they do have children or resent those women who are mothers, and thus try to put them down by emphasizing how glamorous and politically important it is to be a working woman.
What does the research say on stay-at-home mothers vs working mothers in terms of children's cognitive development? I haven't looked in a long time, but my recollection was that it's inherently uncertain because nobody can run a controlled experiment. Mothers are constantly adapting to what they think is best for their children (e.g., Kathie), trying to optimize a variety of factors that differs for each family and, indeed, for each child.
That moms refuse to follow experimental methodologies when it comes to their own kids is bad for science, but good for children.
The Donald Trump $5 million challenge: Actually, I do know what Obama's college GPA was
I'm not sure if this is really worth $5 million, but I suspect the reason few people seem to know what kind of grades Obama got in college is because very few journalists have ever asked him. It's part of this general pattern where nobody ever asks Obama anything interesting about himself. The people who think the answers would be bad can't get to him to ask him, and the people who can get to him fear that that the answers can't possibly be as good as they led the public to believe back in '08, so ixnay on that.
Yet, Obama strikes me as the kind of guy who would remember what kind of grades he got, and would think it a perfectly reasonable question.
Yet, Obama strikes me as the kind of guy who would remember what kind of grades he got, and would think it a perfectly reasonable question.
Indeed, biographer David Maraniss devoted some of the time from his one Oval Office interview with Obama to asking the President how he did in college.
And Obama told him.
As I wrote in my review of Maraniss's book in VDARE last summer:
Thus Maraniss interviewed hundreds of people (and got an Oval Office interview, in which Obama volunteered that he was a B+ student at Occidental and an A- student at Columbia).
On p. 385 of the incredibly detailed (and dull) Barack Obama: The Story, Maraniss says:
"Two years at Oxy (during which his cumulative grades were 'a B-plus,' he later said) ..."
And on p. 465 Maraniss writes:
"He had received mostly A's in his coursework during those two years [at Columbia], he said later, and finished with a 3.7 grade point average."
So, Obama's total GPA for all four years would be around 3.5. That's assuming the President is telling the truth, but saying that you had a 3.5 GPA in a soft major (International Relations or some such) seems like too boring of a lie to make up. But, what do I know? Maybe this is all part of a vast disinformation scheme targeted and me and the other three people who find Barack boring.
Maraniss does not tell us if he asked Obama about his test scores. My guess is that if Maraniss didn't ask, then probably nobody else has ever asked him that. Somebody should ask him. He's probably got the numbers memorized.
My bet would be that Obama's SAT score was rather like his GPA: fine, but not spectacular. He didn't make either National Merit Scholar or the black version, National Achievement Scholar, so we can assume he didn't ace the PSAT. Maybe he was less stoned the day of the SAT? Say, 690 V, 550 M (pre-1995 recentering).
But, I'm just making that up. Who knows? (Until you ask him.)
But, I'm just making that up. Who knows? (Until you ask him.)
I'd bet he did relatively better on the LSAT seven years later, perhaps from de-Chooming.
As for the question of whether Obama benefited from affirmative action, well, he wrote that "undoubtedly" he did. As Obama wrote when he was at Harvard Law:
On the other hand, Harvard Law let Michelle in, and Barack's obviously a lot smarter than his wife. So, he probably didn't need as much racial preference as some of the other black students.
As for the question of whether Obama benefited from affirmative action, well, he wrote that "undoubtedly" he did. As Obama wrote when he was at Harvard Law:
I must say, however, that as someone who has undoubtedly benefited from affirmative action programs during my academic career, and as someone who may have benefited from the Law Review’s affirmative action policy when I was selected to join the Review last year, I have not felt stigmatized within the broader law school community or as a staff member of the Review.
On the other hand, Harvard Law let Michelle in, and Barack's obviously a lot smarter than his wife. So, he probably didn't need as much racial preference as some of the other black students.
October 24, 2012
The Right Stuff for The Bonfire of the Vanities
Who should have been cast in the notoriously bad 1990 movie version of Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities? These suggestions all assume it's 1990, although pop culture history since then is assumed:
Sherman McCoy (played by Tom Hanks): William Hurt or Steve Martin (Hanks is too likable, lacks WASP hauteur)
Self-hating English tabloid journalist Peter Fallow (played by Bruce Willis; character based on Anthony Haden-Guest): Christopher Guest (half-brother of Haden-Guest), Richard E. Grant, or Hugh Grant
Judge Myron "Jewish Warrior" Kovitsky (played by Morgan Freeman in the movie; based on Judge Burton B. Roberts): Alan Arkin
Kramer the hapless Assistant DA (played by Saul Rubinek): Jason Alexander
Rev. Bacon (John Hancock; based on Al Sharpton): Eddie Murphy
Killian (Kevin Dunn; based on streetwise NYC criminal attorney Eddie Hayes): Mickey Rourke, Alec Baldwin, or Dennis Leary
Detectives (Barton Heyman and Norton Parker): Jerry Orbach and Chris Noth
Elderly Albert Vogel (not in movie; based on hustling radical lawyer William Kunstler): Rodney Dangerfield
District Attorney Abe Weiss (F. Murray Abraham): Dustin Hoffman, Michael Lerner (studio mogul in Barton Fink)
District Attorney Abe Weiss (F. Murray Abraham): Dustin Hoffman, Michael Lerner (studio mogul in Barton Fink)
Tall, rawboned, explosively crazy prisoner (not in movie; based presumably on Hunter S. Thompson): Michael Richard
The Mayor (not in movie; based on Ed Koch): Mayor Ed Koch
McCoy's wife and girlfriend (Kim Cattrall and Melanie Griffith): I don't know, but not Kim Cattrall and/or Melanie Griffith
And you can do the same exercise for a hypothetical 2013 remake.
And you can do the same exercise for a hypothetical 2013 remake.
A trillion dollars here, a trillion dollars there, pretty soon you're talking about down the Memory Hole
Today's announcement of the government suing Bank of America for a billion dollars over mortgage frauds committed by Countrywide Financial reminds me of how much one of the key events of the Housing Bubble/Bust remains ignored: namely, Countrywide's January 2005 press release boasting of its We House America initiative to lend One ... Trillion ... Dollars to minorities and lower-income borrowers. (This followed 23 months after Angelo Mozilo's Harvard speech in which he pledged Countrywide to lend $600 billion to minorities and lower-income borrowers.)
I just did a Google search on
and got a grand total of about 18 results back from Google. Here they all are. I realize these dozen and a half pages will be boring -- just PR releases, me, and a few random folks -- but that's the point.
About 18 results (0.30 seconds)
Countrywide sets $1 trillion goal for real estate loan program | Inman ...
www.inman.com/.../countrywide-sets-1-trillion-goal-real-estate...
Jan 14, 2005 – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion in ... - PR Newswire
www.prnewswire.com/.../countrywide-expands-commitment-t...
Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion in Home Loans to Minority and Lower-Income Borrowers. - We House America Challenge Leads the Industry in ...
Countrywide Bank Announces $770,000 in Financial Support to ...
www.prnewswire.com/.../countrywide-bank-announces-77000...
Among them is Countrywide's $1 Trillion We House America(R) Challenge, an aggressive goal to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and lower-income ...
Countrywide Ups Minority Lending Goal to $1 Trillion
www.realtor.org/.../7a760e487a50da4886256fb30055957d?...
Countrywide Home Loans Inc. has extended its minority and low-income lending goal by $400 billion to $1 trillion over the next five years.
Steve Sailer: iSteve
isteve.blogspot.com/
5 minutes ago – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
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I am shocked, SHOCKED to learn that Countrywide ... - Steve Sailer
isteve.blogspot.com/.../i-am-shocked-shocked-to-learn-that.ht...
1 hour ago – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
You shared this
Steve Sailer: iSteve: Obama's Popguns of Singapore
isteve.blogspot.com/2011/.../obamas-popguns-of-singapore.ht...
Dec 21, 2011 – Countrywide also steered more than 10,000 minority borrowers into costly subprime ..... The dollar sum of student loans is ~1 trillion dollars.
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Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion ... - The Free Library
www.thefreelibrary.com › ... › PR Newswire › January 14, 2005
Jan 14, 2005 – Free Online Library: Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillionin Home Loans to Minority and Lower-Income Borrowers; - We House ...
Michael Detwiler's Blog: Totally ridiculous!!
michaeldetwiler.blogspot.com/2012/01/totally-ridiculous.html
Jan 5, 2012 – Countrywide's Other Bill. When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment.
BofA Must Pay Excess Settlement Funds To Acorn Clones ...
www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2829495/posts
Jan 4, 2012 – When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment. The 10-year accord ...
Your Lying Eyes: December 2011
lyingeyes.blogspot.com/2011_12_01_archive.html
Dec 21, 2011 – Given Countrywide's "$Trillion Pledge," some serious recruitment ofminority candidates was needed. To really ramp up minority lending, you ...
Countrywide sets $1 trillion target for home loans to poor, minorities ...
www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-127172336.html
Jan 17, 2005 – Byline: Gregory J. Wilcox Jan. 17--CALABASAS, Calif. -- CountrywideHome Loans Inc. on... | Article from Daily News (Los Angeles, CA) ...
Top Spot - Tags: COUNTRYWIDE Home Loans Inc. MINORITIES ...
connection.ebscohost.com/c/abstracts/14738782/top-spot
ABSTRACT. Reports the favorite mortgage provider of minority groups is Countrywide.... Countrywide's Mozilo Expects to See a Trillion Dollar Servicer by 2005.
DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE - Punta Gorda Tea Party
pgteaparty.org/22.html
When BOA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minoritylending and urban reinvestment. The 10-year accord replaced the bank's ...
Countrywide's Angelo Mozilo: He Warned Us—But Washington Didn ...
www.vdare.com/.../countrywides-angelo-mozilo-he-warned-us...
Jun 22, 2009 – “Anti-Model Minority” Leftists Inventing An Anti-White Pan-Asian Identity.... The roots of Countrywide's catastrophic trillion dollar pledge go back ...
Discuss the ethical issues that caused the downfall of Countrywide
www.solutioninn.com › ... › Business EthicsShare
May 4, 2012 – In 1993, loan transactions reached the $1 trillion mark. Additionally, it was the number-one provider of home loans to minorities in the United ...
BofA Must Fund Acorn 'Clones' - Investors.com
news.investors.com/010412-596657-bofa-must-fund-acorn-cl...
Jan 4, 2012 – Countrywide's Other Bill. When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment.
Battered Bank Syndrome - Investors.com
news.investors.com/.../010612-596992-bank-of-america-victi...
Jan 6, 2012 – Neither did the record $1.5 trillion minority lending and urban ... pledge it made to such groups in 2008, when it took over Countrywide.
Results for similar searches
$335 Million Settlement on Countrywide Lending Bias - NYTimes.com
www.nytimes.com/.../us-settlement-reported-on-coun...
More results for countrywidetrillion minorities
About 18 results
Countrywide sets $1 trillion goal for real estate loan program | Inman ...
www.inman.com/.../countrywide-sets-1-trillion-goal-real-estate...
Jan 14, 2005 – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion in ... - PR Newswire
www.prnewswire.com/.../countrywide-expands-commitment-t...
Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion in Home Loans to Minority and Lower-Income Borrowers. - We House America Challenge Leads the Industry in ...
Countrywide Bank Announces $770,000 in Financial Support to ...
www.prnewswire.com/.../countrywide-bank-announces-77000...
Among them is Countrywide's $1 Trillion We House America(R) Challenge, an aggressive goal to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and lower-income ...
Countrywide Ups Minority Lending Goal to $1 Trillion
www.realtor.org/.../7a760e487a50da4886256fb30055957d?...
Countrywide Home Loans Inc. has extended its minority and low-income lending goal by $400 billion to $1 trillion over the next five years.
Steve Sailer: iSteve
isteve.blogspot.com/
5 minutes ago – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
You shared this
I am shocked, SHOCKED to learn that Countrywide ... - Steve Sailer
isteve.blogspot.com/.../i-am-shocked-shocked-to-learn-that.ht...
1 hour ago – Countrywide Home Loans today announced an expansion of its We House America initiative to fund $1 trillion in home loans to minorities and ...
You shared this
Steve Sailer: iSteve: Obama's Popguns of Singapore
isteve.blogspot.com/2011/.../obamas-popguns-of-singapore.ht...
Dec 21, 2011 – Countrywide also steered more than 10,000 minority borrowers into costly subprime ..... The dollar sum of student loans is ~1 trillion dollars.
You shared this
Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillion ... - The Free Library
www.thefreelibrary.com › ... › PR Newswire › January 14, 2005
Jan 14, 2005 – Free Online Library: Countrywide Expands Commitment to $1 Trillionin Home Loans to Minority and Lower-Income Borrowers; - We House ...
Michael Detwiler's Blog: Totally ridiculous!!
michaeldetwiler.blogspot.com/2012/01/totally-ridiculous.html
Jan 5, 2012 – Countrywide's Other Bill. When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment.
BofA Must Pay Excess Settlement Funds To Acorn Clones ...
www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2829495/posts
Jan 4, 2012 – When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment. The 10-year accord ...
Your Lying Eyes: December 2011
lyingeyes.blogspot.com/2011_12_01_archive.html
Dec 21, 2011 – Given Countrywide's "$Trillion Pledge," some serious recruitment ofminority candidates was needed. To really ramp up minority lending, you ...
Countrywide sets $1 trillion target for home loans to poor, minorities ...
www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-127172336.html
Jan 17, 2005 – Byline: Gregory J. Wilcox Jan. 17--CALABASAS, Calif. -- CountrywideHome Loans Inc. on... | Article from Daily News (Los Angeles, CA) ...
Top Spot - Tags: COUNTRYWIDE Home Loans Inc. MINORITIES ...
connection.ebscohost.com/c/abstracts/14738782/top-spot
ABSTRACT. Reports the favorite mortgage provider of minority groups is Countrywide.... Countrywide's Mozilo Expects to See a Trillion Dollar Servicer by 2005.
DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE - Punta Gorda Tea Party
pgteaparty.org/22.html
When BOA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minoritylending and urban reinvestment. The 10-year accord replaced the bank's ...
Countrywide's Angelo Mozilo: He Warned Us—But Washington Didn ...
www.vdare.com/.../countrywides-angelo-mozilo-he-warned-us...
Jun 22, 2009 – “Anti-Model Minority” Leftists Inventing An Anti-White Pan-Asian Identity.... The roots of Countrywide's catastrophic trillion dollar pledge go back ...
Discuss the ethical issues that caused the downfall of Countrywide
www.solutioninn.com › ... › Business EthicsShare
May 4, 2012 – In 1993, loan transactions reached the $1 trillion mark. Additionally, it was the number-one provider of home loans to minorities in the United ...
BofA Must Fund Acorn 'Clones' - Investors.com
news.investors.com/010412-596657-bofa-must-fund-acorn-cl...
Jan 4, 2012 – Countrywide's Other Bill. When BofA bought Countrywide in 2008, it committed a record $1.5 trillion to minority lending and urban reinvestment.
Battered Bank Syndrome - Investors.com
news.investors.com/.../010612-596992-bank-of-america-victi...
Jan 6, 2012 – Neither did the record $1.5 trillion minority lending and urban ... pledge it made to such groups in 2008, when it took over Countrywide.
Results for similar searches
$335 Million Settlement on Countrywide Lending Bias - NYTimes.com
www.nytimes.com/.../us-settlement-reported-on-coun...
More results for countrywide
Please note that the New York Times result at the bottom is for "More results for countrywide trillion minorities." (In other words, the NYT has never mentioned the word trillion in an article with Countrywide and minorities.)
If you do the search for
you get 23 results instead of 18.
I dunno. I must be nuts. I personally think that a trillion dollars is a big deal, but what do I know? The implications of Countrywide's trillion dollar pledge don't favor one party over the other, they don't favor one ideology over another, and they don't favor the sacred fetish of Diversity, so who wants to know about it?
Nobody.
I dunno. I must be nuts. I personally think that a trillion dollars is a big deal, but what do I know? The implications of Countrywide's trillion dollar pledge don't favor one party over the other, they don't favor one ideology over another, and they don't favor the sacred fetish of Diversity, so who wants to know about it?
Nobody.
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