Monday, June 06, 2005
Finally, Some Musings
While I've written a lot in this blog about things that interest me, I haven't written much of my thoughts and comments on these things: the musing part of my blog is (was) missing.
Well, I'm going to rectify that right away.
One of the most interesting things I've read lately was no doubt about the 'scientific proof' of the high intelligence of Ashkenazi Jews.
I put 'scientific proof' in quotations because some parts of this research are still open to debate and until such a 'genius gene' is irrefutably found I still look at the research as one that the scientific community still needs to look at and approve.
Research such as this one, what one might call racist science, is inevitably teeth grating. Already I have seen white supremacist pages siting the research as proof for Jews' "diabolically clever" nature. Yet research such as this is also helpful in discovering diseases tendencies, harmful genes etc.
In my post about sexism, one of the points was the definition of racism and sexism. Some think that racism and sexism is the actual belief that races and genders are different. For them, this kind of research is racist by nature. They strive to prove the opposite - that no differences exist.
Others, like me, believe that differences exist. Be it from natural selection, evolution, what not. This kind of research therefore supports my view. It doesn't mean that I think people should be treated differently because they belong to a certain race or sex, it just means that we have more information about humanity.
Not only that, but most of the racist and sexist research finds that the differences are the results of years of conditioning (men used to hunt, women gathered fruit hence men are more spatial oriented and women are more detailed oriented etc.). If the conditioning is removed by living in a society that gives equal opportunities to everybody and encourages everybody to act on their wills and wants then maybe in time these observed differences will be minimized and we will finally achieve a truly homogeneous society.
Well, I'm going to rectify that right away.
One of the most interesting things I've read lately was no doubt about the 'scientific proof' of the high intelligence of Ashkenazi Jews.
I put 'scientific proof' in quotations because some parts of this research are still open to debate and until such a 'genius gene' is irrefutably found I still look at the research as one that the scientific community still needs to look at and approve.
Research such as this one, what one might call racist science, is inevitably teeth grating. Already I have seen white supremacist pages siting the research as proof for Jews' "diabolically clever" nature. Yet research such as this is also helpful in discovering diseases tendencies, harmful genes etc.
In my post about sexism, one of the points was the definition of racism and sexism. Some think that racism and sexism is the actual belief that races and genders are different. For them, this kind of research is racist by nature. They strive to prove the opposite - that no differences exist.
Others, like me, believe that differences exist. Be it from natural selection, evolution, what not. This kind of research therefore supports my view. It doesn't mean that I think people should be treated differently because they belong to a certain race or sex, it just means that we have more information about humanity.
Not only that, but most of the racist and sexist research finds that the differences are the results of years of conditioning (men used to hunt, women gathered fruit hence men are more spatial oriented and women are more detailed oriented etc.). If the conditioning is removed by living in a society that gives equal opportunities to everybody and encourages everybody to act on their wills and wants then maybe in time these observed differences will be minimized and we will finally achieve a truly homogeneous society.
