Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

No offense, but not sure you gave that agency, but if we do have it, I know what I blame about you and I don’t want to.

At least correct the typo that I corrected.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

At least correct the typo that I corrected.

No offense, but not sure you have that agency, but if we do have it, I know what I blame about you and I don’t want to.

Whoops, I missed that there was a typo. Probably because fixing it doesn't make the sentence any more coherent.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I do not understand genetics anywhere near as well as many of my clients or my children, but the whole idea of genetics as somehow being immutable - "its in his genes" is a fundamental problem as well. We may be born with some built-in genetic "coding", but that coding won't even guarantee we'll have the same hair color or eye color our whole life.

Likewise, intelligence seems to have a lot to do with how we use the brains we're given, and one thing we know is that the brain changes with use, and can be affected by things like learning a new language (learning a more symbolic language, for example, will light up different parts of the brain and result in different gene signalling). Genes may give you the possibility of having strong symbolic reasoning, but if you don't use them, because you are born into an English speaking family, for example, your genetic signalling shifts because genes apparently don't like to scream into a void (metaphorically).

I'm just saying, the whole "nature/nurture" debate is framed around a really simplistic and kind of weird concept of nature.

And this would have been a welcome response last night. Instead I was hit with blogs "discrediting" the piece by running with a single background sentence and totally ignoring his thesis.

I am in the middle of working out a Moth story about a revelation about the Ashkenazi.

I know one thing about social sciences- I have only read a few Sci Fi books, but I did read Foundation. There is a point (a fictional one, but one that resonated) that as long as man was limited to a single planet's population the numbers were too small for sociology or psychology to make group predictions- but once you get to galactic populations those sciences become very accurate. Of course we live in single planet times, so.... group predictions are probably a bit flawed.

But I did find Bret's thesis interesting. I mean, is there a group that is more homogeneous than the Ashkenazi? The point hit me when the wife and I did the 23 and Me.

I'm 4% African, 2% Native American, 1% Arab- meaning the test dives down to 1% levels. And while my mom's folks were born in a tiny town on the Ionian, I am not 50% Italian. I'm 30% Italian and 20% Greek. My grandma did not fuck someone other than g-pa, so I think that means the test goes back 1000s of years. Their part of Italy was settled by Greeks, but in like 500 BC.

Meanwhile my wife is 100% Ashkenazi. And we have 10 friends in our tiny neighborhood that are 100%. How is that possible? It dives down to 1%, and goes back 2000 years, and. She. Is. 100%. And so are 10 others within a few blocks.

And it occurred to me, this is a really fucking closed group. If any group can show how a culture can influence it is this one.

Her grandparents (and those of the other 10) came here around 1900. They left ghettos in Russia/Ukraine where their families had lived for centuries. There were matchmakers who picked who would breed with whom. Good Ole Hank would not have gotten near the wife back then.

And they settled in US neighborhoods that were heavily Ashkenazi*. That, combined with complications of the religion (eat Kosher as an example) meant that her parents generation mostly married other Ashkenazi. In fact her older cousins raised in that same neighborhood married Jews/

Her parents, and many others, married and moved to suburbs, and dropped the religious constricts (first time I met the in-laws the wife had to ask her mom to make me something other than bacon as I was not eating pork at the time). And Ashkenazi women often have really nice titties. So anyway, men are attracted. And now my kids are 50% Ashkenazi**.

So if you want a group that you can say you can look to, before my kids' generation, to see a homogeneous group and it's influence, I can't imagine too many others better.

I was interested in hearing what people thought about the man's thesis. And instead I got blogs about a random sentence. I admit i had a few drinks in me, and I know I should not expect anything articulate from Ty. But sebby walked Ty's line and it troubled me.

*the neighborhoods were so fixed there is a game my wife and her friends call "Jewish geography." In the 80s, when we were young, we would be at an airport or train station and an older Jewish couple would sit by us and start a conversation. Eventually they'd ask where we were from. She would say "Philadelphia." They would ask, "what part?" The answer they expected was NorthEast- which meant you were a Jew. For Jewish geography to have been a thing, those neighborhoods had to be really solid Jewish. But like I said she grew up in a burb that was non-conclusive.

**I suppose the other 50% being whatever Atticus or Penske is?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

No offense, but not sure you have that agency, but if we do have it, I know what I blame about you and I don’t want to.

Whoops, I missed that there was a typo. Probably because fixing it doesn't make the sentence any more coherent.

By agency, I meant power, or right, to make the statement. I thought you way the fuck out of bounds. But i have an actual degree in science so did not have many courses in rhetoric. Sorry if I confused. You did not confuse, FWIW, instead you met my expectations.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

By agency, I meant power, or right, to make the statement. I thought you way the fuck out of bounds. But i have an actual degree in science so did not have many courses in rhetoric. Sorry if I confused. You did not confuse, FWIW, instead you met my expectations.

Still don't understand what I said that is anywhere close to out of bounds, let alone way the fuck out of bounds. Like many, many other people, I think it was remarkably poor judgment on Bret Stephens' part to write a column about how Jews are smarter than everyone else, since it plays into anti-Semitic stereotypes. Not exactly sure why you find that controversial. Also, Stephens' idea that criticizing Israeli policy is a form of anti-Semitism is wrong and bad for everyone, not just the Jews. Again: Not a controversial idea on my part and something that you can find many Jews (like, for example, John Judis) saying.

Since you appear to be incapable of explaining what you're thinking about it in print, maybe it will have to wait until we can meet in person again.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Still don't understand what I said that is anywhere close to out of bounds, let alone way the fuck out of bounds. Like many, many other people, I think it was remarkably poor judgment on Bret Stephens' part to write a column about how Jews are smarter than everyone else, since it plays into anti-Semitic stereotypes. Not exactly sure why you find that controversial. Also, Stephens' idea that criticizing Israeli policy is a form of anti-Semitism is wrong and bad for everyone, not just the Jews. Again: Not a controversial idea on my part and something that you can find many Jews (like, for example, John Judis) saying.

Since you appear to be incapable of explaining what you're thinking about it in print, maybe it will have to wait until we can meet in person again.

Nothing you say above has anything to do with what you were saying last night. Last night, other than one random sentence, you were linking to stuff about his other writings maybe, I don't know.

You were out of bounds by the shit you said about me, not some random editorial writer. And "way the fuck out," yes.

But as now understood, you hypothesize a Jew should not raise the point that Jews win lots of Nobels, because bragging about Jewish success makes people dislike Jews even more? Thanks for that. Oh, question, since the NYT readers, and especially of the editorial page, are over-educated liberals, are you saying over-educated liberals are prone to disliking jews?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

And this would have been a welcome response last night. Instead I was hit with blogs "discrediting" the piece by running with a single background sentence and totally ignoring his thesis.

I am in the middle of working out a Moth story about a revelation about the Ashkenazi.

I know one thing about social sciences- I have only read a few Sci Fi books, but I did read Foundation. There is a point (a fictional one, but one that resonated) that as long as man was limited to a single planet's population the numbers were too small for sociology or psychology to make group predictions- but once you get to galactic populations those sciences become very accurate. Of course we live in single planet times, so.... group predictions are probably a bit flawed.

But I did find Bret's thesis interesting. I mean, is there a group that is more homogeneous than the Ashkenazi? The point hit me when the wife and I did the 23 and Me.

I'm 4% African, 2% Native American, 1% Arab- meaning the test dives down to 1% levels. And while my mom's folks were born in a tiny town on the Ionian, I am not 50% Italian. I'm 30% Italian and 20% Greek. My grandma did not fuck someone other than g-pa, so I think that means the test goes back 1000s of years. Their part of Italy was settled by Greeks, but in like 500 BC.

Meanwhile my wife is 100% Ashkenazi. And we have 10 friends in our tiny neighborhood that are 100%. How is that possible? It dives down to 1%, and goes back 2000 years, and. She. Is. 100%. And so are 10 others within a few blocks.

And it occurred to me, this is a really fucking closed group. If any group can show how a culture can influence it is this one.

Her grandparents (and those of the other 10) came here around 1900. They left ghettos in Russia/Ukraine where their families had lived for centuries. There were matchmakers who picked who would breed with whom. Good Ole Hank would not have gotten near the wife back then.

And they settled in US neighborhoods that were heavily Ashkenazi*. That, combined with complications of the religion (eat Kosher as an example) meant that her parents generation mostly married other Ashkenazi. In fact her older cousins raised in that same neighborhood married Jews/

Her parents, and many others, married and moved to suburbs, and dropped the religious constricts (first time I met the in-laws the wife had to ask her mom to make me something other than bacon as I was not eating pork at the time). And Ashkenazi women often have really nice titties. So anyway, men are attracted. And now my kids are 50% Ashkenazi**.

So if you want a group that you can say you can look to, before my kids' generation, to see a homogeneous group and it's influence, I can't imagine too many others better.

I was interested in hearing what people thought about the man's thesis. And instead I got blogs about a random sentence. I admit i had a few drinks in me, and I know I should not expect anything articulate from Ty. But sebby walked Ty's line and it troubled me.

*the neighborhoods were so fixed there is a game my wife and her friends call "Jewish geography." In the 80s, when we were young, we would be at an airport or train station and an older Jewish couple would sit by us and start a conversation. Eventually they'd ask where we were from. She would say "Philadelphia." They would ask, "what part?" The answer they expected was NorthEast- which meant you were a Jew. For Jewish geography to have been a thing, those neighborhoods had to be really solid Jewish. But like I said she grew up in a burb that was non-conclusive.

**I suppose the other 50% being whatever Atticus or Penske is?

Don't go drawing too much from 23 and me. There are folks in my wife's family who test 100% Irish whose kids only test 40% Irish.

As to Stephen's view on the world, man, the dude just cited the white nationalist eugenicist right there in the article, it's not like he hid it. And the world's best known evolutionary biologist, among many, many others, spent a good part of the 90s debunking much of this stuff after Murray resurrected the old Nazi pseudo-sciences to argue that minorities in America were irredeemable and social programs were fighting nature.

This idea of racial supremacy, of whatever genetic group, just doesn't come from real science.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Nothing you say above has anything to do with what you were saying last night. Last night, other than one random sentence, you were linking to stuff about his other writings maybe, I don't know.

You were out of bounds by the shit you said about me, not some random editorial writer. And "way the fuck out," yes.

But as now understood, you hypothesize a Jew should not raise the point that Jews win lots of Nobels, because bragging about Jewish success makes people dislike Jews even more? Thanks for that. Oh, question, since the NYT readers, and especially of the editorial page, are over-educated liberals, are you saying over-educated liberals are prone to disliking jews?

Oops. I started to say Icelanders had the most nobel prizes per capita, but it's faroe islanders, followed by Santa Lucians. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...tes_per_capita

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Oops. I started to say Icelanders had the most nobel prizes per capita, but it's faroe islanders, followed by Santa Lucians. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...tes_per_capita

Obama is Kenyan. Where do Kenyans rank?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Nothing you say above has anything to do with what you were saying last night. Last night, other than one random sentence, you were linking to stuff about his other writings maybe, I don't know.

Maybe you should stay off the board when you're drinking.

You were out of bounds by the shit you said about me, not some random editorial writer. And "way the fuck out," yes.

What did I say about you that was out of bounds?

But as now understood, you hypothesize a Jew should not raise the point that Jews win lots of Nobels, because bragging about Jewish success makes people dislike Jews even more? Thanks for that. Oh, question, since the NYT readers, and especially of the editorial page, are over-educated liberals, are you saying over-educated liberals are prone to disliking jews?

What I said has nothing to do with whether Bret Stephens is Jewish. In fact, I didn't know that he was Jewish. And it's not about what he said making people dislike Jews -- you can say positive things about people and still play into stereotypes. Like, "blacks are athletic."

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Maybe you should stay off the board when you're drinking.



What did I say about you that was out of bounds?



What I said has nothing to do with whether Bret Stephens is Jewish. In fact, I didn't know that he was Jewish. And it's not about what he said making people dislike Jews -- you can say positive things about people and still play into stereotypes. Like, "blacks are athletic."

No Mas. And understand this was a peace offering instead of calling you out.

[Hank Chinaski]

Trump on the Embassy attacks: This is not going to be another Benghazi.”


What a complete Shit. I mean not the worst thing he has said, but somehow it just really hits. I have no idea if the bombings made sense. I have an Iraqi immigrant friend who hates the Iranian influence. But to reduce embassy attacks down to a possible political gain is just some vile shit.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Trump on the Embassy attacks: This is not going to be another Benghazi.”


What a complete Shit. I mean not the worst thing he has said, but somehow it just really hits. I have no idea if the bombings made sense. I have an Iraqi immigrant friend who hates the Iranian influence. But to reduce embassy attacks down to a possible political gain is just some vile shit.

Yes, it sucks, my biggest worry is not who takes political credit or blame for stuff going on but whether we can contain whatever war genies are being let out of their bottle.

Someone was commenting that Trump tries to do foreign policy without using either diplomacy or war, the two main tools for time immemorial, and that when that breaks down and he needs to pick up a tool on short notice to deal with an urgent situation the easier tool to grab quickly is always war.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

But I did find Bret's thesis interesting. I mean, is there a group that is more homogeneous than the Ashkenazi?

Yeah, lots of them, but I assume you mean among "white" people in the west.

The point hit me when the wife and I did the 23 and Me.

I'm always kind of blown away when smart people pay to give away their DNA. There's no way it's worth it.

I'm 4% African, 2% Native American, 1% Arab- meaning the test dives down to 1% levels.

Or pretends to. Also, that's not what those numbers actually mean.

Anyway, glad we're moving on from arguing about a column from someone whose writing one should actively avoid.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Adder

Yeah, lots of them, but I assume you mean among "white" people in the west.

The most closed genomes that are frequently studied in the west are Icelanders and Quebecois. Parts of Switzerland are also right up there. They all kept good records than the Ashkenazi, had very little exchange with other populations, and had their records burned and looted less often than the Ashkenazi did, so you can compare what you think you learn from genetics with actual genealogical records.