Robert VerBruggen: Did you hear about Time's Person of the Year?
Jeremy Lott: Who is it?
RV: It's 'you.'
JL: Wait a minute, me?
RV: 'You'
JL: Y-O-U?
RV: Yeah.
W. James Antle: Well f*ck it, I'm putting that on my resume.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
Professor suggests obesity warnings on clothes
I've never been quite sure why academics in a field feel qualified to dream up government solutions to their problems. There's the occasional trauma room expert who makes the leap from "I know that gun injuries are really bad" to "gun control is the best way to reduce them," for example. Some even conduct poorly-thought-through studies toward that end.
Now Naveed Sattar -- who as a professor of metabolic medicine knows that obesity is really bad -- thinks it's a great idea to put obesity helpline numbers on plus-sized clothes' tags.
He defines plus-size as "waists above 102 cm for men, 94 cm for boys, 88 cm or size 16 for women and 80 cm for girls."
Judging by the story, he cannot support his assumption that the obesity problem is a lack of (A) awareness/shame and (B) ability to find help if one wants it. I'd assume most overweight people are aware of the problem and nervous about it, and also that they have doctors to ask for help. Also, helplines are easily available in phone books. Even if obesity is a government problem (it's not), this is a terrible way to attack it.
It's nothing more than an academic who thinks his specialty is so important the state should get involved -- and is egotistical enough to offer ideas without researching them.
It's for the public health, after all. It's not intervention or force, you see, it's merely incentive distortion:
"'People clearly have some responsibility for their health, but society and government have a responsibility to make the preferred, easy choices healthier ones,' he said."
More Health Police State talking points:
"New urban roads should only be built if they have safe cycle lanes and new housing complexes should be constructed only if they have sports facilities and green park areas...
"Prof Sattar also wants ads for slimming services without independent evaluation banned, TV ads for sweets and snacks stopped before 9 pm, higher tax on high fat and high sugar foods and tax breaks for genuine corporate social responsibility."
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Now Naveed Sattar -- who as a professor of metabolic medicine knows that obesity is really bad -- thinks it's a great idea to put obesity helpline numbers on plus-sized clothes' tags.
He defines plus-size as "waists above 102 cm for men, 94 cm for boys, 88 cm or size 16 for women and 80 cm for girls."
Judging by the story, he cannot support his assumption that the obesity problem is a lack of (A) awareness/shame and (B) ability to find help if one wants it. I'd assume most overweight people are aware of the problem and nervous about it, and also that they have doctors to ask for help. Also, helplines are easily available in phone books. Even if obesity is a government problem (it's not), this is a terrible way to attack it.
It's nothing more than an academic who thinks his specialty is so important the state should get involved -- and is egotistical enough to offer ideas without researching them.
It's for the public health, after all. It's not intervention or force, you see, it's merely incentive distortion:
"'People clearly have some responsibility for their health, but society and government have a responsibility to make the preferred, easy choices healthier ones,' he said."
More Health Police State talking points:
"New urban roads should only be built if they have safe cycle lanes and new housing complexes should be constructed only if they have sports facilities and green park areas...
"Prof Sattar also wants ads for slimming services without independent evaluation banned, TV ads for sweets and snacks stopped before 9 pm, higher tax on high fat and high sugar foods and tax breaks for genuine corporate social responsibility."
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Friday, December 15, 2006
New piece up at The National Interest
The National Interest has my new piece. It's an analysis of Ian Bremmer's J-Curve argument, combined with research connecting economic development and democracy.
Study: Vegetarians have higher IQs
It's the latest in the "liberals have high IQs" study series, though at least this one was carried out by real researchers, with data they didn't make up: In one sample, kids who became vegetarians between ages 10 and 30 had average IQs of 105 (nationwide average 100) at age 30.
The most obvious explanation is that vegetarianism is a college student/high-income phenomenon, and the people most likely to get into college or otherwise make lots of money are the bright ones. College students, absurd as they can sometimes be, have higher-than-average IQs.
The way to test whether vegetarianism actually causes high IQ is this: Look at the age-10 IQs and see if they grew in the vegetarians over 20 years. (By and large, your age-10 IQ is extremely similar to your age-30 one.)
From the story:
"However, further analysis of the results showed those who were brainiest as children were more likely to have become vegetarian as adults, shunning both meat and fish."
Higher-IQ people become vegetarians; vegetarians don't magically grow high IQs. So although nutrition and environment in general affect intelligence (see Arthur Jensen's work on the cumulative effect of bad homes and schools), there is no evidence vegetarianism is better for brainpower than a well-balanced meat-inclusive diet.
I don't doubt a vegetarian eats healthier than the average person, boosting IQ by some immeasurable amount. But I don't think there's any difference compared to a healthy non-vegetarian.
Also, bear in mind that an IQ difference of 5 points is one-third of one standard deviation. An individual with an IQ of 105 will not be noticeably smarter than someone with a 100 IQ.
Another of the more interesting tidbits is that vegans actually have lower IQs than the average (95). Do vegans come from a different segment of the population? Or does veganism harm intelligence? Both would surprise me, as veganism is an outgrowth of vegetarianism and IQs are very hard to change.
If dairy truly is indispensable for intellectual development, it's good news for my home state, Wisconsin.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
The most obvious explanation is that vegetarianism is a college student/high-income phenomenon, and the people most likely to get into college or otherwise make lots of money are the bright ones. College students, absurd as they can sometimes be, have higher-than-average IQs.
The way to test whether vegetarianism actually causes high IQ is this: Look at the age-10 IQs and see if they grew in the vegetarians over 20 years. (By and large, your age-10 IQ is extremely similar to your age-30 one.)
From the story:
"However, further analysis of the results showed those who were brainiest as children were more likely to have become vegetarian as adults, shunning both meat and fish."
Higher-IQ people become vegetarians; vegetarians don't magically grow high IQs. So although nutrition and environment in general affect intelligence (see Arthur Jensen's work on the cumulative effect of bad homes and schools), there is no evidence vegetarianism is better for brainpower than a well-balanced meat-inclusive diet.
I don't doubt a vegetarian eats healthier than the average person, boosting IQ by some immeasurable amount. But I don't think there's any difference compared to a healthy non-vegetarian.
Also, bear in mind that an IQ difference of 5 points is one-third of one standard deviation. An individual with an IQ of 105 will not be noticeably smarter than someone with a 100 IQ.
Another of the more interesting tidbits is that vegans actually have lower IQs than the average (95). Do vegans come from a different segment of the population? Or does veganism harm intelligence? Both would surprise me, as veganism is an outgrowth of vegetarianism and IQs are very hard to change.
If dairy truly is indispensable for intellectual development, it's good news for my home state, Wisconsin.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Fact for the day
David Duke "is a long-time resident of New Orleans."
Hmmmm....a white separatist. Who lives in New Orleans.
Hmmmm....a white separatist. Who lives in New Orleans.
Tim Johnson's health problems may make Senate 50-50
A lot of people have rushed to analyze the political effects of Tim Johnson's health problems. If he passes away or is otherwise unable to serve (his condition is critical but stable), a Republican governor will appoint his successor. A Republican appointment would return the Senate to a 50-50 party split.
Johnson suffered bleeding in the brain and underwent an emergency surgery last night.
What few seem to say is: The right thing for the governor to do is appoint a Democrat. That holds no matter what one's political affiliation is (for the record, I'm a libertarian-conservative who votes Republican, yet is kind of partial to divided government).
Let's look back a few years to Jim Jeffords's 2001 betrayal of his conservative supporters. When he left the Republicans to caucus with the Democrats, he gave the Dems a slim majority. But look at the voters in his state: They essentially got to choose between two Democrats. The entire right half of the political spectrum got no say; they went with the most conservative candidate on the ballot, figuring that at least he'd give power to other right-wingers, and then the representative switched after the fact.
At the time, I though it should be illegal to switch parties between elections. If you want to be a Democrat or a Republican, get elected as one -- don't steal Republican votes and then use your sway to give Democrats committee chairmanships. I still believe that.
The same should hold when health becomes an issue: The appointee should have to, at the very least, caucus with the elected party. If a Republican ends up in the seat, South Dakotan voters would have had no chance to elect a Democrat.
Most pundits, as they should be, are focusing on Johnson's health. They haven't started circling around the possibly open seat yet. When they do, Americans should be vigilant about consistency between the Jeffords and Johnson affairs. I have a feeling folks on the left and right will show some (un)surprisingly different reactions.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Johnson suffered bleeding in the brain and underwent an emergency surgery last night.
What few seem to say is: The right thing for the governor to do is appoint a Democrat. That holds no matter what one's political affiliation is (for the record, I'm a libertarian-conservative who votes Republican, yet is kind of partial to divided government).
Let's look back a few years to Jim Jeffords's 2001 betrayal of his conservative supporters. When he left the Republicans to caucus with the Democrats, he gave the Dems a slim majority. But look at the voters in his state: They essentially got to choose between two Democrats. The entire right half of the political spectrum got no say; they went with the most conservative candidate on the ballot, figuring that at least he'd give power to other right-wingers, and then the representative switched after the fact.
At the time, I though it should be illegal to switch parties between elections. If you want to be a Democrat or a Republican, get elected as one -- don't steal Republican votes and then use your sway to give Democrats committee chairmanships. I still believe that.
The same should hold when health becomes an issue: The appointee should have to, at the very least, caucus with the elected party. If a Republican ends up in the seat, South Dakotan voters would have had no chance to elect a Democrat.
Most pundits, as they should be, are focusing on Johnson's health. They haven't started circling around the possibly open seat yet. When they do, Americans should be vigilant about consistency between the Jeffords and Johnson affairs. I have a feeling folks on the left and right will show some (un)surprisingly different reactions.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
New piece up at antiMusic
antiMusic has my hat-trick review of Jay-Z, The Game and Snoop Dogg's CDs.
Main points:
"Kingdom Come is nowhere near as good as The Black Album, to say nothing of Reasonable Doubt. It proves for the umpteenth time Jay-Z can rhyme without effort, but rhyme and compelling narrative are two very different things."
...
"Originality isn't The Game's strong suit, so his claims to be "the number one since B.I.G. and Pac departed" are kind of amusing. But Doctor's Advocate is a fun listen - a throwback to the days of George Clinton samples, gangster bravado and endless talk of chronic and Compton."
...
"While Tha Blue Carpet Treatment beats Kingdom Come and Doctor's Advocate, it can't go beyond the overdone message "I'm a Crip and I have sex a lot."
"But thanks to the production talent Snoop hired, much of the record is pretty impressive. Gone are the often-annoying beats from R&G (see "The Bidness" and "Can I Get a Flicc Witchu" in particular), replaced by sleek, catchy, hip-shaking rhythms courtesy The Neptunes, Soopafly, Dr. Dre and others."
Main points:
"Kingdom Come is nowhere near as good as The Black Album, to say nothing of Reasonable Doubt. It proves for the umpteenth time Jay-Z can rhyme without effort, but rhyme and compelling narrative are two very different things."
...
"Originality isn't The Game's strong suit, so his claims to be "the number one since B.I.G. and Pac departed" are kind of amusing. But Doctor's Advocate is a fun listen - a throwback to the days of George Clinton samples, gangster bravado and endless talk of chronic and Compton."
...
"While Tha Blue Carpet Treatment beats Kingdom Come and Doctor's Advocate, it can't go beyond the overdone message "I'm a Crip and I have sex a lot."
"But thanks to the production talent Snoop hired, much of the record is pretty impressive. Gone are the often-annoying beats from R&G (see "The Bidness" and "Can I Get a Flicc Witchu" in particular), replaced by sleek, catchy, hip-shaking rhythms courtesy The Neptunes, Soopafly, Dr. Dre and others."
Media condescends on Holocaust denial
Typically, the media tries fairly hard to stay balanced; they just fail and slant left from time to time. But when reporters cover Iran's Holocaust denial conference, they don't even try. If they don't tell us we're supposed to despise these people, you see, we won't figure it out ourselves.
Don't worry, the media is there to hold your hand and inform you Nazis are bad. In case you missed that, or anything.
Mind you, this is in no way, shape or form a defense of Holocaust denial. This Wikipedia analysis is good for the curious (though it's not very encyclopedic and might get deleted), and for a college paper I pointed out that even one Holocaust denier's own case doesn't really make the Germans look any better: He says Nazis rounded the Jews up, and then disease, not controlled genocide, ripped through the population. The "Final Solution" was Jewish deportation, not extermination. Laughable, but again, it was still the Germans' fault.
This post is just a case that the media doesn't trust us to come to the right conclusions on the matter.
Fox News puts "researchers" in scare quotes, even though the people at the conference are researchers -- they research ways to deny the Holocaust. AFP gives a similar treatment to "revisionists," even though the nutjobs are, in fact, revisionists.
The whole thing reminds me of this AP article, which called eugenics a "phony science." Eugenics may be morally reprehensible -- at least when carried out through killing rather than selective mating; few would lament the decline of Tae-Sachs in Ashkenazi Jews.
But it's not psuedoscience. If your goal was to decrease the number of brown-eyed people, and you shot all the brown-eyed people, you would in fact see a lower proportion of brown-eyed people in the next generation. That's disgusting, but it's also a scientifically validated way to achieve the goal. We have Darwin to thank for that.
It's understandable that the media doesn't feel the need for objectivity when it comes to Holocaust denial and eugenics. Both have undeniably bad consequences for society, of course. But loaded terminology isn't helping anyone understand evil better; it only talks down to readers by implying they can't discern good from evil themselves.
"Just the facts, ma'am," is good advice for reporters, whether the subject is the local fair, abortion or ethnic cleansing.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Don't worry, the media is there to hold your hand and inform you Nazis are bad. In case you missed that, or anything.
Mind you, this is in no way, shape or form a defense of Holocaust denial. This Wikipedia analysis is good for the curious (though it's not very encyclopedic and might get deleted), and for a college paper I pointed out that even one Holocaust denier's own case doesn't really make the Germans look any better: He says Nazis rounded the Jews up, and then disease, not controlled genocide, ripped through the population. The "Final Solution" was Jewish deportation, not extermination. Laughable, but again, it was still the Germans' fault.
This post is just a case that the media doesn't trust us to come to the right conclusions on the matter.
Fox News puts "researchers" in scare quotes, even though the people at the conference are researchers -- they research ways to deny the Holocaust. AFP gives a similar treatment to "revisionists," even though the nutjobs are, in fact, revisionists.
The whole thing reminds me of this AP article, which called eugenics a "phony science." Eugenics may be morally reprehensible -- at least when carried out through killing rather than selective mating; few would lament the decline of Tae-Sachs in Ashkenazi Jews.
But it's not psuedoscience. If your goal was to decrease the number of brown-eyed people, and you shot all the brown-eyed people, you would in fact see a lower proportion of brown-eyed people in the next generation. That's disgusting, but it's also a scientifically validated way to achieve the goal. We have Darwin to thank for that.
It's understandable that the media doesn't feel the need for objectivity when it comes to Holocaust denial and eugenics. Both have undeniably bad consequences for society, of course. But loaded terminology isn't helping anyone understand evil better; it only talks down to readers by implying they can't discern good from evil themselves.
"Just the facts, ma'am," is good advice for reporters, whether the subject is the local fair, abortion or ethnic cleansing.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
College students endorse cop killer
This story is not interesting so much for its content -- a bunch of liberal groups at City College of New York got together to endorse Tupac Shakur's godmother, a cop killer who escaped to Cuba -- as for the press coverage it's getting. In fact, the only interesting thing about cop killer fetishists is that they claim the convicted perpetrator is innocent, instead of coming out and saying "he did it, that's obvious, but I hate the police so much I'm fine with that."
Except Ice-T. He at least spoke what was on his mind.
Anyhow, people tend to care what college students think for some reason. It's true that today's college students will run tomorrow's world, but it's also true they'll be grown up by then.
I only graduated six months ago, so I can say with absolute certainty: When Chef from South Park says, "there's a time and place for everything, and it's called college," he's not kidding. Students live in a parent-subsidized bubble where political views (and many-to-most personal behaviors) are completely detached from their consequences. Communism can work, the Soviets just weren't true enough to Marx's plan!
So instead of getting all angry (disclosure: I do sympathize, as my father is a retired police officer), Americans should just ignore these folks. Many of the students will look back with embarrassment five years from now, and most of the others will at least shut up. A few will work for radical groups with little influence. No worries; it'll blow over.
Also, a little background on the "framed" Assata Shakur, who was also wanted for felonies including bank robbery.
From Wikipedia:
"Assata Shakur (born Joanne Deborah Byron Chesimard July 16, 1947 in North Carolina) was an activist in the Black Panther Party...Shakur grew up in New York City and attended Manhattan Community College and CCNY, where she was involved in many political activities. Granted political asylum in Cuba (where she presently lives), Shakur remains a fugitive from New Jersey and the United States for her 1979 escape from prison. She had been incarcerated for the 1973 slaying of New Jersey State Police officer Werner Foerster. She was also convicted of a second murder, for the death of fellow activist Zayd Shakur, who was killed that night along with officer Foerster in the shooting."
Nice lady. The incident:
"On May 2, 1973, Shakur, at that time a member of the Black Liberation Army and no longer a member of the Black Panther Party, was stopped on the New Jersey State Turnpike by State Troopers James Harper and Werner Foerster, along with two Black Panthers: Zayd Shakur and Sundiata Acoli, for driving with a broken taillight. According to police records, Shakur opened fire on the troopers, and a gunfight ensued, during which Zayd Shakur was killed and Trooper Foerster, Assata Shakur and Trooper Harper injured. Shakur then exited the car, took Trooper Foerster's weapon, and allegedly shot him twice in the head.
"Sundiata Acoli, Assata and Zayd Shakur then got back into their car and drove for eight miles. Sundiata then exited the car with the wounded Assata and the dead Zayd and fled into the woods and was captured after a manhunt the following day."
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Except Ice-T. He at least spoke what was on his mind.
Anyhow, people tend to care what college students think for some reason. It's true that today's college students will run tomorrow's world, but it's also true they'll be grown up by then.
I only graduated six months ago, so I can say with absolute certainty: When Chef from South Park says, "there's a time and place for everything, and it's called college," he's not kidding. Students live in a parent-subsidized bubble where political views (and many-to-most personal behaviors) are completely detached from their consequences. Communism can work, the Soviets just weren't true enough to Marx's plan!
So instead of getting all angry (disclosure: I do sympathize, as my father is a retired police officer), Americans should just ignore these folks. Many of the students will look back with embarrassment five years from now, and most of the others will at least shut up. A few will work for radical groups with little influence. No worries; it'll blow over.
Also, a little background on the "framed" Assata Shakur, who was also wanted for felonies including bank robbery.
From Wikipedia:
"Assata Shakur (born Joanne Deborah Byron Chesimard July 16, 1947 in North Carolina) was an activist in the Black Panther Party...Shakur grew up in New York City and attended Manhattan Community College and CCNY, where she was involved in many political activities. Granted political asylum in Cuba (where she presently lives), Shakur remains a fugitive from New Jersey and the United States for her 1979 escape from prison. She had been incarcerated for the 1973 slaying of New Jersey State Police officer Werner Foerster. She was also convicted of a second murder, for the death of fellow activist Zayd Shakur, who was killed that night along with officer Foerster in the shooting."
Nice lady. The incident:
"On May 2, 1973, Shakur, at that time a member of the Black Liberation Army and no longer a member of the Black Panther Party, was stopped on the New Jersey State Turnpike by State Troopers James Harper and Werner Foerster, along with two Black Panthers: Zayd Shakur and Sundiata Acoli, for driving with a broken taillight. According to police records, Shakur opened fire on the troopers, and a gunfight ensued, during which Zayd Shakur was killed and Trooper Foerster, Assata Shakur and Trooper Harper injured. Shakur then exited the car, took Trooper Foerster's weapon, and allegedly shot him twice in the head.
"Sundiata Acoli, Assata and Zayd Shakur then got back into their car and drove for eight miles. Sundiata then exited the car with the wounded Assata and the dead Zayd and fled into the woods and was captured after a manhunt the following day."
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Monday, December 11, 2006
Mac/PC commercial parody bashes Christian culture
I'm not familiar enough with Community Christian Church to know everything about it, but given its a church I'd think spreading Christianity would be one of its main goals. Its mission statement confirms that.
I have to wonder, then, why it would make these videos, which have gotten play on Andrew Sullivan and elsewhere.
In a parody of the Mac/PC commercials, a hip Christian doesn't wear his faith on his sleeve and doesn't concentrate too much on Christian music. Meanwhile, the stodgy Christian actually dresses up to go to church and buys an iPod-like mp3 player that only works with Christian music. The whole thing is obviously meant to appeal to a youth audience.
I am not religious myself, so from my high school experience I can sympathize with the drive to make fun of intolerant Christians (I got the "you're going to hell and you must worship the devil" thing from time to time). But the commercials don't make fun of intolerant Christians, they make fun of the Christians who believe what they preach, preach often, respect others and participate publicly in youth Christian culture.
In my experience, those are some of the nicest Christians around. In high school a friend of mine even took me to see a Christian rock group play at a church. She'd debate me on my agnosticism (the kind of engaging conversation I'd never have at the quite-secular four-year college I attended), but she was never one of Sullivan's dreaded "Christianists." I haven't been good at keeping in touch with her, but she was a poster child for Christian youth and almost certainly would not have liked these commercials.
So, how is it in the church's interest to criticize young Christians so broadly? There's a certain appeal in "we're Christian, but not crazy," but it just goes to far. In the music and fashion thing particularly -- teens often listen to one genre to the exclusion of all others, so slamming people who only listen to Christian rock pretty much insults your obvious target audience. Teens also often express themselves by dressing to stand out (I was a fan of the metal shirt or all-black ensemble), so the "you can be a Christian while looking like everyone else" has its downside.
(Other teens, of course, simply wear what everyone else does, so it's a mixed bag. One of the church in question's main concepts is "followership.")
Finally, there's enough Christian bashing coming from outside the church. It's baffling why a Christian group would join in.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
I have to wonder, then, why it would make these videos, which have gotten play on Andrew Sullivan and elsewhere.
In a parody of the Mac/PC commercials, a hip Christian doesn't wear his faith on his sleeve and doesn't concentrate too much on Christian music. Meanwhile, the stodgy Christian actually dresses up to go to church and buys an iPod-like mp3 player that only works with Christian music. The whole thing is obviously meant to appeal to a youth audience.
I am not religious myself, so from my high school experience I can sympathize with the drive to make fun of intolerant Christians (I got the "you're going to hell and you must worship the devil" thing from time to time). But the commercials don't make fun of intolerant Christians, they make fun of the Christians who believe what they preach, preach often, respect others and participate publicly in youth Christian culture.
In my experience, those are some of the nicest Christians around. In high school a friend of mine even took me to see a Christian rock group play at a church. She'd debate me on my agnosticism (the kind of engaging conversation I'd never have at the quite-secular four-year college I attended), but she was never one of Sullivan's dreaded "Christianists." I haven't been good at keeping in touch with her, but she was a poster child for Christian youth and almost certainly would not have liked these commercials.
So, how is it in the church's interest to criticize young Christians so broadly? There's a certain appeal in "we're Christian, but not crazy," but it just goes to far. In the music and fashion thing particularly -- teens often listen to one genre to the exclusion of all others, so slamming people who only listen to Christian rock pretty much insults your obvious target audience. Teens also often express themselves by dressing to stand out (I was a fan of the metal shirt or all-black ensemble), so the "you can be a Christian while looking like everyone else" has its downside.
(Other teens, of course, simply wear what everyone else does, so it's a mixed bag. One of the church in question's main concepts is "followership.")
Finally, there's enough Christian bashing coming from outside the church. It's baffling why a Christian group would join in.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Sailer on diversity's downside
Yesterday I ran some numbers indicating that higher diversity in a country is linked to higher incarceration.
I'm curious what Steve Sailer would think about it, because his VDare column today covers another downside to diversity. Statistically, races vote in blocs more consistently when other races have a lot of political power.
He writes:
"Race is more relevant in the voting booth in direct proportion to the racial diversity of the electorate. In elections in the South today, race is the single biggest factor determining who votes for whom, black or white, Republican or Democrat, precisely because there is a very large black voting bloc that votes uniformly Democratic (96-3 for Gore over Bush in the 2000 election). Both races vote to advance their own interests. If whites in the South didn't vote almost as much as a bloc as blacks do, they'd lose."
I'm curious what Steve Sailer would think about it, because his VDare column today covers another downside to diversity. Statistically, races vote in blocs more consistently when other races have a lot of political power.
He writes:
"Race is more relevant in the voting booth in direct proportion to the racial diversity of the electorate. In elections in the South today, race is the single biggest factor determining who votes for whom, black or white, Republican or Democrat, precisely because there is a very large black voting bloc that votes uniformly Democratic (96-3 for Gore over Bush in the 2000 election). Both races vote to advance their own interests. If whites in the South didn't vote almost as much as a bloc as blacks do, they'd lose."
NYT obtains police report on shooting
A leaked document from the NYPD might actually make the Bell shooting more, not less, murky. Up until now, the story that made the most sense was that cops were undercover at a strip club and believed three men were about to do something violent. They followed the suspects to a car.
One officer tried to stop the suspects, but the car's driver tried to run him over. The officer fired, with the bullet going through the car and toward the van behind it -- which contained the other officers. Those officers thought the shot came from inside the car. Much shooting ensued.
But now:
"In his statement to police, Benefield said Bell repeatedly drove forward and in reverse after officers opened fire, the newspaper reported. His account contradicts police statements that the detective opened fire after being hit by Bell's car."
Also, the cops don't seem to have their stories together:
"The report reveals that none of the witnesses recalled hearing anything close to 50 rounds, The Times said. The sergeants who arrived after the shooting told investigators that two of the plainsclothes officers said they were unsure whether they had even fired at all, the newspaper reported."
They don't remember if they shot or not?
Finally, the "fourth man" argument -- cops were saying there was possibly a fourth guy who had a gun but ran -- is fading:
"Witnesses interviewed for a preliminary report on the police shooting of three men — including a groom on his wedding day — did not mention a fourth, possibly armed man who police say may have been present before officers opened fire, a newspaper reported Monday.
...
"The report also contains no indication that police were searching after the shooting for a fourth man, the paper said."
On a side, note, terrible story. The suspects are, in the writer's voice, "victims." There's still too much unknown to make that kind of call. The NYT story the AP account is based on is equally bad, and pretty roundabout in getting to the point.
I also blogged about the shooting here. At that point I was pretty sympathetic to Heather Mac Donald's argument that, no matter what happened, the guys in the car played a major role in it. Now things aren't looking so positive for the police.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
One officer tried to stop the suspects, but the car's driver tried to run him over. The officer fired, with the bullet going through the car and toward the van behind it -- which contained the other officers. Those officers thought the shot came from inside the car. Much shooting ensued.
But now:
"In his statement to police, Benefield said Bell repeatedly drove forward and in reverse after officers opened fire, the newspaper reported. His account contradicts police statements that the detective opened fire after being hit by Bell's car."
Also, the cops don't seem to have their stories together:
"The report reveals that none of the witnesses recalled hearing anything close to 50 rounds, The Times said. The sergeants who arrived after the shooting told investigators that two of the plainsclothes officers said they were unsure whether they had even fired at all, the newspaper reported."
They don't remember if they shot or not?
Finally, the "fourth man" argument -- cops were saying there was possibly a fourth guy who had a gun but ran -- is fading:
"Witnesses interviewed for a preliminary report on the police shooting of three men — including a groom on his wedding day — did not mention a fourth, possibly armed man who police say may have been present before officers opened fire, a newspaper reported Monday.
...
"The report also contains no indication that police were searching after the shooting for a fourth man, the paper said."
On a side, note, terrible story. The suspects are, in the writer's voice, "victims." There's still too much unknown to make that kind of call. The NYT story the AP account is based on is equally bad, and pretty roundabout in getting to the point.
I also blogged about the shooting here. At that point I was pretty sympathetic to Heather Mac Donald's argument that, no matter what happened, the guys in the car played a major role in it. Now things aren't looking so positive for the police.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.
Sunday, December 10, 2006
U.S. leads world in incarceration rates
This story piqued my interest....so I spent several hours doing statistical research on it. According to Reuters, the U.S. has the highest number of prisoners in the world due to "tough laws."
There's a lot of truth to that, as U.S. incarceration rates have risen and fallen with the drug war and mandatory sentencing laws. Now the U.S. towers over the other 27 "full democracies" (as decided by The Economist's Democracy Index). The U.S. rate is 738 for every 100,000 people; Uruguay comes in second at 193.
But the thing is, there is a very strong statistic in America toward minorities being more crime-inclined. Oddly enough, America has a higher incarceration rate than the countries these immigrants came from (first in the world, after all). Besides America being just plain tough -- which is true -- what could be going on here?
For readers who don't like statistics, the long and short of it is that diversity is linked to incarceration rates in the world's leading democracies. I believe that is due to the facts that (A) immigrants and other minorities tend to be poorer and (B) it's easier to be tough on crime when a significant minority will bear the burden; the smaller race is an "other." This is not necessarily to say that diversity is a bad thing, just that it has this very negative effect.
I decided to do a correlation between diversity and incarceration rate in the world's full democracies. I kept it to full democracies because it doesn't tell us much that Rwanda, a failed state, has an incarceration rate of 152. It also doesn't help that China clocks in at 118. As a U.S. writer I'm interested in states most like the U.S.
I measured diversity in terms of ELF, or the Ethno-Lingustic Fragmentation index -- the odds that two random people from a country will be of different ethnicities or speak different languages. I used James D. Fearon's numbers when available (they are here, and you can open them with Stata or convert them to Excel with StatTransfer ), but sometimes I had to go with Philip Roeder's (already in Excel; they're from 1985 but match up with Fearon's fairly well in the countries for which both have data).
I realize mixing and matching data isn't a good thing, but as Rumsfeld might say, "you do statistics with the numbers you have, not the numbers you want." If anyone has a full and recent set of ELF numbers, please send them to me (or better yet, calculate yourself!).
The incarceration rates came from the International Centre for Prison Studies , the group cited in the Reuters article.
Because the U.S. is such an outlier in terms of incarcerations (and because it's one of the few countries Fearon and Roeder have very different numbers for), I excluded it.
What I came up with (using this online calculator) was really quite striking. I had an R value of .4603, the square of which is .212 -- diversity explains 21 percent of variation in incarceration rates (that does not necessarily mean it causes 21 percent of incarcerations). It is quite statistically significant, with a P of less than .01596 (less than .05 is the benchmark). In a given country, the more likely two random people are from two different ethnicities, the more likely one of them is incarcerated.
Please bear in mind I'm not a statician. If you'd like to re-run the equations, shoot me an e-mail and I'll send my data (robertv4311[at]gmail.com). And always bear in mind that correlation is not causation; I above suggested some of the reasons diversity and incarceration might be linked, and I'm sure there are many, many more. It's not as simple as diversity causing prison terms.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com/ and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com/.
UPDATE: I just found something very odd.
I e-mailed The Audacious Epigone about this post -- he actually has a clue when it comes to statistics. He suggested I look at criminality in addition to incarceration rates. So I did, using Wikipedia's list of most-recent-available rates.
I excluded the U.S. as an outlier (also because of the varying ELF numbers) again.My theory was that if diversity and incarceration were linked more strongly than diversity and criminality were, there was something to my idea that diversity added to incarceration in ways other than bringing in crime-prone minorities. In diverse societies, tough-on-crime measures are easier to pass because the criminals are less like society at large.
I used the murder rate to measure criminality because it's best -- as Charles Murray pointed out, murders are almost always reported, so the data isn't affected by police priorities, failure to call law enforcement, etc. Presumably, sometimes murders fluctuate independently of other crimes, but it's the best measure available.
I was far more right than I'd imagined, assuming I'm measuring what I'm trying to. Diversity and murder are not even correlated -- my P value was <.6737, which translates to "holy crap is that statistically insignificant." Even if we ignored that, the R squared was .0072, meaning diversity explains .72 percent of the murder data. Negligible.
I was a little skeptical -- maybe the Wikipedia numbers were just bad. So I ran a correlation between incarceration and murder. Crime priorities vary by country, but the two should at least be linked in the world's best democracies. Here I got P<.01008 (very statistically significant), R squared .238. The murder rate explains about 24 percent of the incarceration data, which sounds about right. Other crimes can fluctuate differently than murder, and different countries take very different crime control steps.
So what does this say about the diversity debate? Well, for one, liberals can certainly argue there's something intolerant about these countries or even human nature.
One thing I've noticed from experience is that diversity often actually leads to intolerance. I grew up in a lily-white Wisconsin suburb (I could count my high school's minorities on two hands, maybe one), but I had some friends who'd moved up from more diverse cities. One once made a comment to the effect that, "I like it here. You can like minorities without having to be around them."
It was an unguarded moment, and he probably didn't completely mean it, but these numbers seem to show that's not uncommon.
UPDATE II: All data available on Google Spreadsheets here.
Got it bad, got it bad, got it bad
This story indicates one of the major problems with public education. A teacher lost her job when kids discovered a porn flick she'd starred in, and now it looks like she could get her gig back.
From the story:
"School officials immediately suspended Dye, banned her from school property, and as a non-tenured teacher, told her soon after that her contract would not be renewed. She didn't receive a public hearing on her dismissal because she got paid for the duration of her contract.
"Dye's attorney, Mark Blankenship, argues that the school district didn't give her a fair shot, and that's one of the reasons he encouraged her to re-apply to get her teaching position back
....
"Nancy Waldrop, assistant superintendent for the school district, told the Associated Press that Dye's history will have no bearing on whether she is re-hired, but she has concerns that the students may be distracted by the adult-film discovery if she were to return."
First of all, if the teacher's history got her fired (ahem, not renewed), how could it have no bearing on whether she's re-hired? That's like if worked at Wal-Mart, stole, got fired, re-applied and got mad they took into account I stole. And they agreed!
It's also amusing the teacher's lawyer is calling it "speculation" that knowledge of the porn tape could once again cause a disruption. It's like he's never been in a high school before.
The bottom line is that, in most jobs, hiring is a process of discrimination. Managers discriminate in favor of the people most likely to achieve the goals of the company -- regardless of why the applicants are able to do that. On some level it's unfair she's having trouble turning her life around, but high school teaching demands a person students haven't seen in a porno. In hiring, results should come first, especially for such an important job.
In the private sector, this is only a problem if you discriminate against protected groups. For example, even though IQ tests predict job performance, the Supreme Court ruled they couldn't be used in hiring because of their disparate racial impact. But "porn star" is most definitely not a protected class under discrimination law. If only the school would stick to its guns and say, "When we let people go for cause, we don't hire them back."
For a more dramatic example of this-teacher-just-won't-go-away, check out this flow chart on how to fire a teacher in New York.
On an unrelated note, I totally can't get the Van Halen video for "Hot for Teacher" out of my head right now.
Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://www.therationale.com/ and http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com/.
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