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Politically Incorrect Observations About Human Nature
Posted by
Zonk
on Sat Jul 07, 2007 10:15 PM
from the keep-it-civil dept.
from the keep-it-civil dept.
gsa writes "Why do men prefer blonds? Why are most suicide bombers Muslim? Psychology Today analyzes some of these non-politically-correct questions in this essay about ten politically-incorrect truths about human nature. It turns out there may be an evolutionary or psychological explanation for all of these observations. For example, 'Sociologists and demographers have discovered that couples who have at least one son face significantly less risk of divorce than couples who have only daughters. Why is this? ... There is relatively little that a father (or mother) can do to keep a daughter youthful or make her more physically attractive. The continued presence of (and investment by) the father is therefore important for the son, but not as crucial for the daughter. The presence of sons thus deters divorce and departure of the father from the family more than the presence of daughters, and this effect tends to be stronger among wealthy families.'" Update: 07/08 05:51 GMT by Z :Removed sentence that misquoted article.
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References? (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead, I will just say "References, please?"
I have noticed that Psychology Today, as a magazine, is notoriously short on scientific data, either theoretical or experiential, and long on tossing around "the common wisdom". If I want stereotypes and dimestore philosophy, I am sure I can find someone on the back of the bus to repeat them to me.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
That said, the claim that polygamy is only part of the problem of male/female in imbalance in Muslim countries [geohive.com]:
Bahrain - 134 males/100 females
Kuwait - 150 males/100 females
Oman - 126 males/100 females
Qatar - 203 males/100 females
Saudi Arabia - 122 males/100
Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
Why aren't there large groups of angry young Alaskans commiting acts of terrorism?
I'll tell you why. Because in Alaska, they get Comcast On-Demand porn.
All we need to do it carpet-bomb the middle east with porn.
Hell..... we're spending $12 billion a month on the Iraq war. At about $5000 each, we can purchase about 2.4 million anatomically correct dolls from realdoll.com [slashdot.org] and end the islamic terrorist problem with just one month's war cost!
Just carpet-bomb the middle east with a bunch of naked "real dolls".
Tell the muslim freaks that they're virgins being dropped from heaven by Allah.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
-jcr
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Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
Combined with polygamy, this gender imbalance creates a whole underclass of men who will likely never get married or even have sex over their entire lifetime. Promised 72 virgins by manipulative terrorist recruiters, they'd gladly give up a poor life that only offers celibacy.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
-jcr
Parent
That means Asia is even worse off, if true. (Score:5, Informative)
Things are definitely not any better in Asia. Whether as a result of sex-selection abortions, infanticide, disease / selective access to medical care, or some other reason, the male/female ratios in Asia are even further off than in the Middle East. (There are a lot of references on this, because it's obviously a big problem to any one in India...here's one [businessweek.com].)
So if Oman, Saudi Arabia, and other M.E. countries are "male heavy" as a result of migrant workers (which, again, is only true if you're looking at adult statistics, which I'm not sure is the case) than that means the male/female ratio in whatever areas these workers are coming from -- presumably Asia -- even more dire, since their absence is serving to cover up the problem.
Parent
Re:That means Asia is even worse off, if true. (Score:5, Informative)
UAE - ~4M - imbalance of roughly 1.5M
Saudi Arabia - ~28M - imblance of roughly 2M
Jordan - ~6M - imbalance of roughly 300K
Syria - ~19M - imbalance of roughly 400K
Oman - ~3M - imbalance of roughly 300K
Yemen - ~22M - imbalance of roughly 440K
Qatar - ~900K - imbalance of roughly 270K
Pakistan - ~164M - imbalance of roughly 3.3M
Iran - ~65M - imbalance of roughly 800K
Iraq - ~27.5M - imbalance of roughly 300K
Tunisia - ~10M - imbalance of roughly 72K
Libya - ~6M - imbalance of roughly 156K
Algeria - ~33M - imbalance of 267K
Morocco - ~34M - imbalance of roughly -100K
Total Population: ~422.4M
Total imbalance: ~10M
Average ratio is 1.048:1
That's right in line with the ratio of 1.064:1 for the nearby and predominately Hindu India.
Additionally, the entire 10M difference could easily be swallowed up by immigrant workers coming from areas of higher population - India's got 1.12B people, Indonesia 235M, Thailand 65M, Philippines 91M, etc. So over-all there really ain't anything to see here.
Parent
Re:References? (Score:5, Informative)
From The World CIA Factbook: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-worl
note: 73.9% of the population in the 15-64 age group is non-national (2007 est.)
Why so many non-nationals? If I remember I read an article about how effing rich they are and how they are in the middle of a huge economic boom as they shift the basis of their economy from oil to catering to the super rich of the world. Their standard of living for citizens is very very high so they import laborers to do the dirtier work. Mostly from the Philippines iirc.
Also they are not a very fundamentalist Muslim nation. One of the United State Military's favorite places to hang out during off time in the region is Dubai http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dubai [wikipedia.org] in the UAE because they are so western friendly. (Friends of mine that have been their say it is like one big American shopping mall). So, you may need to rethink part of your assertation, at least in regards to the UAE.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
I note that http://www.intute.ac.uk/sciences/worldguide/html/
It also points out that 50% of the population is South Asian and that only 19% of the population is Emirati. I think it is relatively clear what is going on here has a lot more to do with a large group of foreign workers and the statistics don't provide much support one way or the other for anything to do with honor killings.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
The situation is even worse in other rich countries like Qatar. They have only very few inhabitants in relation to their wealth. About every family has at least one maid from the Philippines and nearly all work is done by Indians. The state pays for nearly everything (being married brings you free land to build on, having a child about $5k/month) and natives get only good jobs in high positions that are well paid and require hardly and work (i.e. being head of the local museum, with an assistant who does all your work).
Yet to keep the entire infrastructure running, many non-national workers are required since there are none or too few native inhabitants who would be willing to perform those duties.
Parent
Re:References? (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually in Sudan, the oppression of africans, even muslim ones, by arab muslims is something the caliphs would probably recognize. So even though pressure from Britain and other european powers forced them to formally abolish slavery eventually, and it took until 1962 in Saudi Arabia, arabs still prey on vulnerable people from the same regions as they did in the hundreds of years when it was still legal.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
Citizens of the US could perform massive amounts of philanthropy (oh wait: they do), and it wouldn't matter, because all it takes is one moronic incident to blow all of the good will.
The US, just like one of its flagship companies, MicroSoft, is simply going to be hated so long as it exists.
Even in some hypothetical case where the US went away, it would still be hated by governments seeking to distract attention.
Remember all of these TCP/IP packets we're sending/receiving to interact with
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Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:References? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0214/p07s02-wome.ht
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/05/18/iraq.ho
http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,344374
and also
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/16/world/europe/16
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Re:References? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:References? (Score:5, Interesting)
Whereas I could also pull out a Bible and cite examples that support incest, beating your wife, and a multitude of other ideas.
Religion can be manipulated quite easily to justify just about anything you want to do. People have raped, slaughtered, robbed, and a plethora of other not-very-nice-things to people in the name of Jesus.
So, I don't particularly give a damn what any prophet or religious leader or whatever said anywhere at anytime. All that matters is "Are they doing it now, and if so, at what scale?" People will find their justification later.
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Re:References? (Score:4, Informative)
If you dare to call those who mention this fact "trolls", I hereby call you a nazi censor. Sorry. You shouldn't have been trying to hide someone words if you don't like them. There is a difference between questioning a fact and attacking the person mentioning it (aka "ad hominem").
I do agree with you about the Bible supporting rape, genocide, etc. Not incest in particular, but that's a detail compared to phrases like "if you come to a city, you have to deliver an ultimatum to the citizen: either surrender and be put into slavery, with their young wives and daughters being taken as spoils for you and old wives killed -- or, refuse and be murdered to the last man, woman and child. Except for the following tribes: A, B and C (which happen to be your closest neighbours), where you don't have a choice and need to slaughter them all.". That's Bible.
But if you're Muslim, I have bad news for you: a 54 years old man who has sex with a 9 years old is a pedophile no matter who he is.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Informative)
"What we found in talking to the [bombers'] families and people in the community--and I want to limit this to the women whose stories we looked into--all of them had very traumatic personal stories and issues. Those things, combined with the horrors of living under occupation, could have provoked them to act.
"What kind of personal problems?
"One [terrorist], for example, was the first female suicide bomber in the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, Wafa Idris. She was married off at a very young age and could not have kids. In that society a woman, a wife, who can't have kids is considered worthless. The husband [divorced Wafa and] married someone else and had kids with her.
"Wafa also worked with a humanitarian organization on the West Bank where she saw a lot of carnage [from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict]. You might say that she was a very depressed person."
National Geographic: Female Suicide Bombers: Dying to Kill [nationalgeographic.com]
"Riyashi is hailed as a courageous resistance fighter among Palestinians throughout Gaza and the West Bank, but the truth about what drove her to such a terrible act is much more complex. Palestinians in Gaza and Israeli internal-security experts who studied the background of her case say Riyashi's husband had discovered that she was having an affair with a senior Hamas commander. Among conservative Palestinians, as in other parts of the Islamic world, an adulterous woman is often punished with death. Riyashi was given a second option: she could become a martyr.
"Behind the motives of religion and rage at Israeli occupation, Palestinian women, far more than men, tend to choose self-sacrifice as an exit from personal despair, while others are pushed into it for having broken taboos in strict Palestinian society."
Time: Palestinian Moms Becoming Martyrs [time.com]
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Excluding outying data (Score:5, Informative)
None of these 10 statements were meant to be universally correct. Wealthy parents more likely to have boys? How does that explain Paris and Nikki Hilton? I doesn't, but that isn't the point.
Regarding the female suicide bombers, perhaps their rationale wasn't sex-related at all? Maybe they lost a family member or loved one in the fighting? Maybe they just really, really believe in the cause?
So what's the use in a theory that doesn't explain the entire situation? Consider this: maybe if young Muslim males had more access to mates, there wouldn't even be a cause. It'd be too hard to find a steady supply of young, impressionable males to kill themselves and abandon their families. That females are willing to join the ranks of the males is irrelevant if the rules of the game are changed fundamentally.
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this isn't a math problem (Score:4, Informative)
In a psychology problem, you just accept that there will be bits of random noise in the data. The world is complex. Maybe the female suicide bomber felt transgendered, maybe she felt sorry for her brother, maybe she smoked too much pot, maybe she was promised that her family would be cared for (Hamas does this), maybe she was told she'd be tortured if she didn't... whatever. It is merely noise in the data.
There is a bit of math that applies though. It seems you haven't studied statistics, particularly the idea of confidence. Obviously the numbers won't be in an article intended to summarize things; that would make for hundreds of boring charts.
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Re:References? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:References? (Score:5, Insightful)
Some might say that it is because men are less attractive with blond hair, so the trait tends to reach a balance. Perhaps; yet I have never seen evidence for that claim, and in fact, sociobiological theory generally claims that appearance is more important for women (whereas power, authority and resources/money are more important for men). Given that, we would expect to see blond hair in more than half of the population - at least given enough time. Thus, the only defense left is that not enough time has passed for the trait to spread. Perhaps. Yet research seems to show people with blond hair appearing in sizable numbers 10,000 years ago in Europe [timesonline.co.uk] - quite a long time indeed. Not enough...?
Blond hair does seem like an attractive trait these days. But we can't tell if that is a cultural matter (which, in turn, can be either long-lived or just a fad) or something biologically-based - or both. Sociobiological theory cannot quantify the effect of biology on social behavior, and therefore is somewhat limited as a science.
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Re:References? (Score:4, Insightful)
Muslims are responsible for most suicide missions now that the US has invaded the middle east. When America was in Vietnam, it was the Viet Cong who were doing the suicide bombing.
I suspect a combination of an asymmetric force, desperation, and hopeless living conditions will always produce people who are willing to sacrifice themselves to destroy their oppressors.
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Uh (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, I saw this artical on Digg the other day and that's where it should have stayed.
Re: keeping up with the Joneses (Score:5, Insightful)
- You can't keep up with Digg because Digg has 100-200 front page articles/day, while Slashdot has 10-20. But know this: that's how we like it. And we don't even mind having slow news days where there are only 5 front page articles. If there's no news, don't add filler.
- We read slashdot for intelligent articles, not the mindless crap found on digg. If you're going to insist on posting crap, we'll just go read the same crap elsewhere a few days earlier.
Seriously, mod parent up. Let's keep this crap off Slashdot. Tag the story "stupid", "notslashworthy", and/or "seenondigg".Parent
"Why do men prefer blonds?" (Score:5, Insightful)
The Bottom Line is.... (Score:5, Funny)
Spending hours playing Quake? Deep down, somehow, it's all about getting laid.
Watching football on Sunday? yep.... about getting laid.
Posting on slashdot? yeah.. well... this is a tough one. Okay, nothing anybody has ever posted on slashdot has ever led to someone getting laid.
Well... whatayaknow.... that's me!
hehehe
Re:The Bottom Line is.... (Score:5, Insightful)
So, males play Quake, watch football (i.e., vicariously play football), and post to Slashdot (the eternal dick-waving contest) under the subconscious motivation that it will (indirectly) get you laid, not because females observe this behavior and are attracted to it, but because in a more primitive society, similar activities serve as practice for the capabilities that females are attracted to. In other words, it will get you laid.
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Re:The Bottom Line is.... (Score:5, Funny)
Have some balls, man. Ask her in a setting where she has the option of saying "no" without coming off as a heartless bitch.
In a just world, asking someone to marry you in front of thousands of strangers should not only lead to LESS sex, it should lead to no sex ever again for the perpetrator.
The first woman I see mouth the words "NO!" when some cowardly dork proposes to her in front of thousands of strangers is the woman I'll divorce my wife for.
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Re:The Bottom Line is.... (Score:5, Funny)
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OH RLY? (Score:5, Funny)
That's absurd. I'd love to explain why, but I am in a rush to apply for some new credit to my daughter.
Hip-waist ratio myth disproven years ago. (Score:5, Interesting)
I think it's safe to assume the rest of the article is filled with similar bullshit.
Sex cures terrorism... (Score:5, Funny)
So they're bombing us so that they can go get laid in heaven with those 72 virgins.
I guess we need to start some sort of global escort service to stop terrorism.
Re:Sex cures terrorism... (Score:5, Funny)
Let's all look at why Muslims are upset:
First of all, in the Muslim religion, you're not allowed to have what?
Sex. Good.
There's no sex until marriage in the Muslim world.
Now, this would be fine except that in the Muslim religion you also can't, Anybody? Jack off.
Okay, jacking it is strictly forbidden in the Muslim religion. And what do we know about the places Muslims live? They live in? Good, sand.
Now put yourself in the shoes of a Muslim. It's Friday night, but you can't have sex, and you can't jack off. There's sand in your eyes and probably in the crack of your ass, and then some cartoon comes along from a country where people are getting laid, and mocks your prophet. Well you know what? I'd be pretty pissed off too!
You know, i realize that these hacks are just trying to sell a book, and are probably laughing all the way to the bank at all the ignorant people who actually take it seriously, but given that they have a PHD, they might try to make it bit more convincing that South Park. Not to degrade South Park, it is one of the most insightful shows on TV. And it gains points because it admits it basic worthlessness rather than trying to wrap itself in the facade of respectability.
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father- daughter (Score:5, Funny)
Not just "politically" (Score:4, Interesting)
It's a poor "mix-and-match" mixture of poorly carried out studies, wrong assumptions, "facts" pulled out of thin air, and just plain pseudo-science.
All of the reasons why we prefer one or another physical trait in each other is dumbed down to "it makes you look healthier". But we actually knew thus far, thank you very much. The actual reasons are usually way more subtle and related to the way our brains have evolved to process information, and the resulting perception we have for the world around us.
But why not - let's dumb it all down. The condescending tone doesn't help either.
To top it all, after you've done reading the article, this online magazine offers a handy form:
"Find a therapist near you"
I suggest you check it out, since after you're done with this article, you'll need it.
This is why open source exists (Score:4, Funny)
Do you ever wonder what really drives guys to spend the time working on open source software? According to #7:
Both crime and genius are expressions of young men's competitive desires, whose ultimate function in the ancestral environment would have been to increase reproductive success.
Men have had to conquer foreign lands, win battles and wars, compose symphonies, author books, write sonnets, paint cathedral ceilings, make scientific discoveries, play in rock bands, and write new computer software in order to impress women so that they will agree to have sex with them.
Beware The Source! (Score:5, Informative)
Linking to Psychology Today is embarrassing.
Lucifer (Score:5, Informative)
soft science (Score:5, Insightful)
What a real scientist does is not only come up with personally preferred models, but also comes up solicits competing models, and searches for deficiencies in the preferred model. This is why at the end of so many peer reviewed finding one sees the list of disclaimers and the need for future work. In this case, for instance, what might be the other reasons for differences noted in the gender ration based on income. A real scientist does not whine that no one agrees with hypothesis, at least not in print. They wait to the to gloat one they win the nobel prize.
Here is the point. There is nothing wrong with ideas stated in the article. The PC angle merely identified Pych Today as the pop culture tabloid that it is. It exists to sell advertising, and has little positive scientific or social value. I recall my psychology teacher specifically banning it from the reading list, and such a statement from such a soft science is significant. The issue is that these are presented as stipulate truths rather than works in progress, and have no critical thinking attached. For instance, while it is true that certain body shapes in women do have easier time delivering babies, it is likely untrue that anything other than age is a general predictor of fertility. As many boys have discovered, there is no one more fertile than a teen aged girl. Many of them get pregnant just looking at sperm. And as many a delivery nurse will tell you, those babies tend to pop out of the girls, no matter what the shape.
So what we have here is a collection of ideas that people wish were true, and to some extent are. However, just stopping at these "truths" limit the discovery of deeper and more complete truths. Is the big breasted girl really the ultimate treasure, or is more than a mouthful a waste? Do certain income ranges foster certain genders, and if so, why do I know so many wealthy families, at least in developed countries, with all girls? Are frat boys who engage in innocent date rape just following their evolutionary calling, or are they just socialized to be assholes?
To complicate matters, we also have the issue of how much of science is objective, and how much is created by the researcher. On interesting thing I find in my reading is the more I see the word "truth" used, the less objective the science is. My hypothesis is that this happens because in softer research where "truth" is acceptable, the research is cherry picking data and studies to support a pre existing notion. The outcome of the "research" is a foregone conclusion, and any negative input is ignored. OTOH, in harder research, while most of the time may be spent trying to prove a preexisting idea, there is at least the realization of other points of view, so the outcome is more of a defensible argument for rationality rather than a truth.
And because so many cheap shots were taken in this article, let me end with another. I expect very soon to be reading why dark skin people are not evolutionary suited for television or film or high level executive positions. or why women, which much research has shown to be stronger workers, caring for babies, and the fields, and the mate, are nevertheless the weaker sex.
In the end this appears to be cherry picked research with no attention paid to the statistical contribution of other factors. I am sure that if any of the writers ever had a methods course, the slept through it. In the end, these appear to be hacks trying to sell a book, capitalizing on the neocon movement I can see it now, some guy wants to divorce the wife who put him through school, and marry some young girl, goes to court and says judge, it is not my fault, my first wife never gave me any boys, how could I possible lover her? And to add to that, she was not a naturall blonde and her boobs were fake. I was entrapped!
Barbie (Score:4, Interesting)
Rule of thumb (Score:4, Informative)
One Caveman's Observation... (Score:5, Insightful)
Who came up with this drivel? The last time I checked, MOST couples are kinda fat, kinda ugly, don't have a lot of money, and are having way more sex with each other than that average looking guy trying to hook up with the hot woman. Ugly people need loving too, as do small people, as do geeks. Everyone has a match, and this concept of bigger man gets the action is lame. If only the biggest and prettiest people are mating, how do you explain, well, the American South, or England? (Ok, that was a joke, don't kill me).
Re:Misquoted?? (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
By the way, at least the article managed to put forth some conjectures, even if they don't cite any studies. Your "nuh-uh" rebuttal leaves something to be desired.
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Re:The wealthy abort more (Score:4, Informative)
That might make a particle of sense except for one little problem. How do you abort your female fetus if you don't know the sex? When people were using nightroot for an abortificent, they didn't have electricity, much less ultrasound.
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Re:About the Authors (Score:5, Funny)
Alan S. Miller is Professor of Behavioral Science at Hokkaido University, Japan
Dr. Satoshi Kanazawa is an evolutionary psychologist at the London School of Economics.
Miller is from Japan. Kanazawa is from London. Huh? Swapping countries? Maybe, subconciously, they think this will get them laid.
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