It’s still not obvious to me. Can you unpack a little here?
What is most confusing to me about your comment is what it means for two examples of unfairness to be fundamentally different, rather than… um… non-fundamentally different (superficially different?). For example, is there some framework I can use to determine whether, say, treating able-bodied people differently from handicapped people is also fundamentally different from treating black people differently from white people, or is fundamentally the same and merely superficially different, or is not different at all, or...?
I’ll try to unpack that, especially since the original post was so sloppy.
The original post said “But why is it that the rest of the world seems to think that individual genetic differences are okay, whereas racial genetic differences in intelligence are not?”. This is incorrect. “The rest of the world” seems to think that individual genetic differences in intelligence exist and are meaningful, whereas racial genetic differences do not. (Does Yudkowsky really think that anti-racist activists believe that black people are inherently less intelligent and that that fact should be ignored? I’m not sure how else to read that.)
The unfairness of individual differences in intelligence is that, well, it happens and it’s unfair. The unfairness of racial differences in intelligence is that they don’t exist, but people act as though they do, and it’s that second part that’s unfair. These are two different kinds of unfairness. For the first, changing people’s minds won’t do a darned thing; it’s like trying to persuade water to run uphill. For the second, changing people’s minds will, following the above logic, reduce the amount of unfairness in the world, because the source of the unfairness is in those people’s minds.
So, treating able-bodied people differently from disabled people is… well, it depends. If you treat someone in a wheelchair like they can’t walk, that’s the first kind. (They actually can’t walk; it’s not anyone’s fault.) If you treat someone in a wheelchair with no obvious signs of mental impairment like they have impaired intelligence, that’s the second kind. (They’re just as clever as anyone else; the unfairness is entirely in the way you’re treating them.)
I agree with you that there’s a difference between treating groups differently based on differences that actually exist, and based on differences that don’t actually exist, and that the second thing involves a kind of unfairness that’s different from the first thing.
That said, it does seem to me that a lot of people not only think that racial genetic differences in intelligence don’t exist, they also think that if racial genetic differences in intelligence did exist, that would be a bad thing, in a way that they don’t think that the existence of individual genetic differences in intelligence are a bad thing.
It’s still not obvious to me. Can you unpack a little here?
What is most confusing to me about your comment is what it means for two examples of unfairness to be fundamentally different, rather than… um… non-fundamentally different (superficially different?). For example, is there some framework I can use to determine whether, say, treating able-bodied people differently from handicapped people is also fundamentally different from treating black people differently from white people, or is fundamentally the same and merely superficially different, or is not different at all, or...?
I’ll try to unpack that, especially since the original post was so sloppy.
The original post said “But why is it that the rest of the world seems to think that individual genetic differences are okay, whereas racial genetic differences in intelligence are not?”. This is incorrect. “The rest of the world” seems to think that individual genetic differences in intelligence exist and are meaningful, whereas racial genetic differences do not. (Does Yudkowsky really think that anti-racist activists believe that black people are inherently less intelligent and that that fact should be ignored? I’m not sure how else to read that.)
The unfairness of individual differences in intelligence is that, well, it happens and it’s unfair. The unfairness of racial differences in intelligence is that they don’t exist, but people act as though they do, and it’s that second part that’s unfair. These are two different kinds of unfairness. For the first, changing people’s minds won’t do a darned thing; it’s like trying to persuade water to run uphill. For the second, changing people’s minds will, following the above logic, reduce the amount of unfairness in the world, because the source of the unfairness is in those people’s minds.
So, treating able-bodied people differently from disabled people is… well, it depends. If you treat someone in a wheelchair like they can’t walk, that’s the first kind. (They actually can’t walk; it’s not anyone’s fault.) If you treat someone in a wheelchair with no obvious signs of mental impairment like they have impaired intelligence, that’s the second kind. (They’re just as clever as anyone else; the unfairness is entirely in the way you’re treating them.)
Does that clear things up a bit?
Yes, thanks for clarifying.
I agree with you that there’s a difference between treating groups differently based on differences that actually exist, and based on differences that don’t actually exist, and that the second thing involves a kind of unfairness that’s different from the first thing.
That said, it does seem to me that a lot of people not only think that racial genetic differences in intelligence don’t exist, they also think that if racial genetic differences in intelligence did exist, that would be a bad thing, in a way that they don’t think that the existence of individual genetic differences in intelligence are a bad thing.
Do you disagree?