Geneticists And Economists Clash Over "Genoeconomics" Paper 213
scibri writes "One side is accused of supporting ethnic cleansing; the other of being intellectually naive. Geneticists and economists are struggling to collaborate on research that explores how our genes influence and interact with economic behavior. Top economists are publishing a paper that claims a country's genetic diversity can predict the success of its economy. To critics, the economists' paper seems to suggest that a country's poverty could be the result of its citizens' genetic make-up, and the paper is attracting charges of genetic determinism, and even racism. But the economists say that they have been misunderstood, and are merely using genetics as a proxy for other factors that can drive an economy, such as history and culture."
Correlation is not causation (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe it's the other way around, I would say it's more likely that economic success causes immigration, and therefore diversity.
If you RTFA (Score:4, Informative)
you see the following:
The paper argues that there are strong links between estimates of genetic diversity for 145 countries and per-capita incomes, even after accounting for myriad factors such as economic-based migration.
Re:If you RTFA (Score:4, Insightful)
That's impossible. Immigration is the only cause of genetic diversity in humans.
Re:If you RTFA (Score:5, Insightful)
That's impossible. Immigration is the only cause of genetic diversity in humans.
No, it isn't. War, for example, is traditionally a huge cause of genetic diversity (after conquering a place, soldiers would often... well, rape the local women, to be frank, and even in a less-extreme scenario often slept with the more willing local women as they traveled). There is a reason there were often massive population booms after an invading army swept through a country. Any traveler has a possibility of spreading diversity, even if they aren't immigrating, and genes will spread across borders slowly over time even if the population remains relatively stationary.
Re:If you RTFA (Score:4, Insightful)
War of conquest is a form of immigration.
Re: (Score:2)
Fucking is the only cause of genetic diversity.
No, that only creates more combinations of the same genes.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, I should've RTFA. The Nature headline misleadingly talks about prediction but there is no mention of that in the article, just pointing out common patterns between economic and genetical data. It's hard to tell what exactly the paper claims without reading it.
Re:Correlation is not causation (Score:4, Informative)
I recommend you read this article: Correlation is not causation : The Internet Blowhardâ(TM)s Favorite Phrase
The correlation phrase has become so common and so irritating that a minor backlash has now ensued against the rhetoric if not the concept. No, correlation does not imply causation, but it sure as hell provides a hint.
Re: (Score:3)
By that logic we should get rid of the Pythagorean theorem, it's become too common and irritating. Could it be that the reason so many people point this out is because it's true?
Re: (Score:2)
On Slashdot, they point to it because they have seen others doing it being rewarded with a +5, insightful. It's nothing but trite meme regurgitation, highly correlated with not having read or understood TFS. Hell, it's almost as if the hurry to be the first one to post it caused them to miss the story. But meh, what do I know. A 1:1 correlation of ignorance and early posting of 'correlation is not causation' does not imply causation. It does, however, imply stupidity.
Re:Correlation is not causation (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
No, the reason why so many people point out "correlation is not causation" is because it's a convenient way to dismiss inconvenient correlations. In other words, it's a way to play stupid while pretending to be scientific and logical. Which is what's causing the backlash, too.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed, but it's worth adding that it doesn't necessarily provide useful clues of the causal chain that it hints to, if any.
For example, one possible explanation that I can draft off the top of my head without being an expert and without having RTFA, is the following:
Re: (Score:2)
...and Slashdot ordered lists are not well rndered (Score:3)
Oh, come on, Slashdot! I'm not allowed to use an ordered list in my comments?
You are, but their POS stylesheet hides the numbers. If, for example, I "Disable Styles" in Safari 6's Develop menu, your list magically becomes numbered - the page looks completely like ass, but at least the fucking ordered lists are numbered, not just ordered. At least as I read, for example, the HTML 4 section on lists [w3.org], "visual user agents" should "number ordered list items". I guess a stylesheet are supposed to be able to override any aspect of presentation in the spec, but it's still really bogus to
Re: (Score:2)
There's a lot of possible answers mixed in everywhere.
1. As you say... success encourages immigration
2. Perhaps genetic diversity allows different strengths from various genetic backgrounds to manifest themselves.
3. Perhaps there is a high tie in with culture and genetics... and different cultures interacting and mixing their ideas produce innovative results
4. Perhaps history is accounted for the spread of empire and the mixing that occurs there is also a cause for prosperity. When the British mixed with th
ignore facts because of potential for misuse? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, I guess scientists had better go back and un-invent and un-discover any empirically verifiable or useful thing they may have invented or discovered that has the potential for misuse.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:ignore facts because of potential for misuse? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ignore facts because of potential for misuse? (Score:5, Insightful)
This and very much this. It's hard to imagine a marriage between genetics, a real science and economics - something that tails astrology and is just one jump ahead of homeopathy as a 'science'.
You will never get anything useful out of it. Economists should not be allowed to pretend to read hard science papers. It will just give them airs.
Re: (Score:2)
Fair point, it's just disappointing that nobody thinks of this while participating in DARPA projects and other "defense" related work.
Re: (Score:2)
Replace "economic" with "academic" and water down the list of indefensible practices; you have our modern college admission policies, and the same people furious over studies like these advocate the hell out of practices like that.
TED Talks (Score:2)
I thought we already determined that humans were as stupid as Monkeys when it came to economics and assessment of economic risk.
http://www.ted.com/talks/laurie_santos.html [ted.com]
The stupidz. Itz in ur geenz.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Monkeys are smarter than us in some cases:
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/08/video-income-inequality-enrages-monkey/261374/ [theatlantic.com]
Why would that be a surprising conclusion? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's ok for genes to predicate athletic ability, but not other abilities or behaviours?
Obviously our genes influence other behaviours. The small minded might not like that, but that's the way it is. Those who cry "racism" do a diservice to humanity in general - the bell curve applies to all populations, and the distribution of genes within a population is widely distributed. Studying how those genes interact is a good thing!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, Genes don't necessarily determine behavior, but they can play a big part in encouraging behavior.
My brother has genes for both a lean, athletic build, and ADHD, therefore he plays soccer due to his genes both giving him an advantage and a desire to run off steam.
I have a gene for very fair skin. I sunburn quickly, therefore my behavior is influenced towards wearing long sleeves or staying indoors on bright sunny days.
I know all living things including humans are just big, complex chemical and physica
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, and origin of silicon is supposed to determine the frequency of a processor made of it.
Some things are KNOWN to have no dependence either observed or possible, and people like you should shut the fuck up instead of talking about them.
Re: (Score:2)
Some things are KNOWN to have no dependence either observed or possible, and people like you should shut the fuck up instead of talking about them.
So... genetics is known to have no influence on behavior? I'd definitely like to see that research. Or by "known" do you mean "not actually known but held by people so they appear not to be racist"? On the contrary, I can say that it very much is known that genetics will have an influence on behavior. People born with more testosterone will be more aggressive, people with dopamine dysfunctions tend to have certain psychoses, etc., and such things can be cause by genetic traits. Now, whether those traits can
Re: (Score:2)
So... genetics is known to have no influence on behavior?
There is no evidence for any of that in humans (who are not noticeably genetically diverse to begin with), and no proposed mechanism for such influence other than handwaving.
Re: (Score:2)
Many mental illnesses (edge case examples of behavior) have known genetic components.
I got a bad case of pyromania from my dad. My mom forced him to never mention his bomb making youth to us as kids. But was he ever happy when I came to him looking for the ingredients to make nitroglycerin. Once I got there on my own he was able to tell me his stories. He also told me that nitrocellulose was much much safer then nitroglycerin.
Re: (Score:2)
Not a single thing in this world is KNOWN to have no dependence.
That's incorrect. The frequency of stupid outburst from you, does not depend on the phase of the moon, contrary to the belief that originated the word "lunacy".
Re: (Score:2)
You're absolutely right.
However, I'd caution that predicting athletic ability is a little easier since you can trace the genes directly involved in making a person able to do physical labor. Genetics almost certainly affects just about everything in some form, but the effects are much more indirect in cognitive skills, and direct genetic factors could be completely overwhelmed by other factors.
That said, I also agree that we should not let racism shut down what is, in effect, an empirical truth: people hav
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, genes influence intelligence and behavior, but environmental factors have a much larger role. Not so with atheletic ability.
Re: (Score:2)
It's just a coincidence that almost all champion boxers grew up poor?
Re: (Score:2)
So what you're saying is that all or at least the majority of Olympic athletes came from or were closely related to a long line of people who specialised in the same sport?
I'm gonna need a link there, champ.
These researchers were courting disaster (Score:2)
Doesn't scale (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
More Eugenics, where is the outrage? (Score:3)
Sorry, but this is yet another modern version of Eugenics being pushed in to your face. Just like "using DNA to determine future criminals" and "Detecting psychopaths by Tweets".
The people working on these papers expressing opinions like this are dangerous and should be locked up. Yes, it's that simple and yes, the propaganda they are spreading is extremely dangerous. If you don't understand the danger, go read a fucking history book and see what happens when people are convinced that genocide or racial superiority are good things.
Education and Society dictate a persons capabilities. If a person has a good education and ample opportunity, they tend to work for the betterment of the society they received their education in and have the opportunities in. If a person lacks education, how can they better society? If a person has education and no opportunity, what choice do they have other than harming society to survive? (And to usurp any stupid arguments you may have regarding farmers not needing education or some such, you are wrong. Farmers need to know how to be farmers, and need to know how to be content to be the best farmer possible. That requires as much education regarding society as a rocket scientist requires, but of course lacking the sciences required by the rocket scientists.)
This is basic sociology and psychology, with countless historical examples showing both sides of the argument. Hell, Socrates discussed the same thing in "The Allegory of the Artisan" (go read Plato's "The Republic" you lazy bastards!) well over 2 thousand years ago. It's not new, yet we still fall prey to the rhetoric of evil greedy people.
Re:More Eugenics, where is the outrage? (Score:4, Insightful)
Education and Society dictate a persons capabilities.
Do you have any supporting evidence of this other than a naive "I wish it were like this so it must be so!"
Want to throw out decades of research that support genetic influence of behavior on such diverse issues as alcoholism, personality disorders, etc...
A simple search of scholarly articles will give you plenty of studies conducted on identical twins raised in diverse social and economic situations, that have a genetic predisposition towards specific behaviors.
According to your point, if I had the right education, in the right society, I could be a NFL linebacker, correct?
Absurd.
Re: (Score:2)
Naw, hell we have never ever had educated functional societies. History has never recorded anything for us to review, it's all just delusion based just like Carnegie Melon and Rockefeller tell us right?
Sarcasm aside, there is a tremendous amount of research backing my statements. If what I stated was false, we would never have seen a successful black person in America. It would have been impossible, because social opportunity and education would have no bearing on their abilities to move within society.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
The people working on these papers expressing opinions like this are dangerous and should be locked up.
People shouldn't be locked up just for having opinions. In fact, on the scale of dangerous ideas, these papers are nothing compared to what you just wrote in that quote.
Re: (Score:2)
The people working on these papers expressing opinions like this are dangerous and should be locked up.
I think they would argue it's not opinion but data.
Facts are sometimes repugnant to our worldviews, but it must be our worldviews that are adjusted in response to facts, not denying the facts.
I have no idea whether or not the paper in question IS factual or whether it's flawed. Just pointing out that this is an incorrect response.
Re: (Score:2)
"The people working on these papers expressing opinions like this are dangerous and should be locked up. "
Let me get this right: You want to put someone in jail for something they might be able to do because it may allow other people to be put in jail for what they might be able to do.
Re: (Score:2)
For advocating and spreading propaganda supporting eugenics, society should be demanding they be locked up.
Re: (Score:2)
Did you read TFA? I'm thinking you are asking me to relieve yourself from guilt.
In an open letter, the group said that it is worried about the political implications of the economists’ work: “the suggestion that an ideal level of genetic variation could foster economic growth and could even be engineered has the potential to be misused with frightening consequences to justify indefensible practices such as ethnic cleansing or genocide,” it said.
Commentors missing the point (Score:3)
The authors of the paper come right out and say that they are not arguing for a genetic *cause* to the correlations they measure.
Rather that since genetics and culture are both transmitted along family lines, that genetic diversity within a country is a useful proxy for cultural diversity, and that certain degrees of cultural diversity correlate with improved economic performance.
This has nothing to do with eugenics, and everything to do with a more quantifiable way to study the effect of culture clashes on a country's economy.
Only one proposition is valid (Score:2)
Only one of those 3 propositions is correct :
* infinite growth is possible is a finite world
* economics is a science
* Duke Nukem Forever has been released
Re: (Score:2)
Only one of those 3 propositions is correct : * infinite growth is possible is a finite world * economics is a science * Duke Nukem Forever has been released
I had no idea DNF had been released!
The greatest thing that could happen to humanity (Score:2)
Don't tell me there's not a genetic component to any of this, because there is. Women are less greedy, less warlike, less anti-social, more responsible, more cooperat
Slavery / Oppression? (Score:2)
Note: I do not condone slavery or appartheid as a form of politics, but it is just a theory for the results
Maybe what the researchers have found (given the history of humanity) is that in a country with several ethnics groups you can have a ruling elite that concentrates capital and act as a whole to keep their privileges, and an oppressed, cheap workforce without rights to be used as a source of "profits"
That said, anyway it probably is just a structural development; Great Britain and Germany in XIX centur
Re:Genetic diversity... (Score:4, Insightful)
Check out the genetic profiles of those living:
1. In govt run "projects" housing
2. In govt funded Welfare
3. In govt funded food stamp programs
4. In govt funded Medicaid
Adjust for % of each race in the the nation...and see what you come out with?
Regardless of your findings...which if done soundly with regard to the science of numbers...you'd get roasted over a public open fire and branded a racist.
While there is a huge cultural component to this...perhaps the culture also is somewhat genetics based?
Re:Genetic diversity... (Score:4, Funny)
...perhaps the culture also is somewhat genetics based?
I'll bet you a dollar that it's not [imdb.com]
Re: (Score:3)
Now, look at the genetic social and family profiles of those who had to start out with less than nothing after being imported as property (but only the young and healthy, not the elders) and treated as sub-human even after being ruled no longer property.
In the U.S. there is a myth that anyone can succeed and that background has no part mostly because there are a fair few very wealthy wastes of oxygen that want to pretend that their great fortune in life is somehow connected to some greatness within them. T
Re: (Score:2)
I guess you're alluding to the black slaves in the US.
Really man...been over 100 years, I think we should quit allowing people to blame that and use it as a crutch or excuse for social and cultural problems, don't you?
And yes...one CAN still succeed in th
Re:Genetic diversity... (Score:4, Insightful)
You may be unaware, but black people in the U./S. being regarded as somehow too dirty or inferior to use the same water fountain, lunch counter, or school as white kids is still within living memory.
Equal opportunity? You're saying Joe Blow stands just as much opportunity to get a multi-million dollar friends and family investment in his new widget company as Daddy Warbucks kid? I think not.
The U.S. provides more opportunity than a country with an active caste system, but the claim that the opportunity is anything like equal is pure fantasy.
Re: (Score:2)
"The US is about equal opportunity for all...not equal outcomes"
Libertarian Core Principle.
Re: (Score:3)
"The US is about equal opportunity for all...not equal outcomes"
Libertarian Core Principle.
myth. libertarians believe in the inheritance of wealth which utterly blows any possibility of equal opportunity out of the water.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Genetic diversity... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's been about 147 years since the thirteenth amendment. That puts the era of slavery outside living memory, true. However, if we consider a lifespan of about 80 years, that means that there can certainly still be people alive today who are only one generation removed from slavery. So, the era of pre-thirteenth amendment slavery may be history, but it's a long way from being dead history.
Add to that the fact that the thirteenth amendment hardly fixed everything. For starters, it didn't actually ban slavery. The amendment quite clearly left the door open for slavery as a punishment for crime. This does stop hereditary slavery, but otherwise leaves pretty much every other element of slavery open to continue (except for the nebulous protection of the eighth amendment's "cruel and unusual punishment" clause) for anyone convicted of a crime. Convicting poor, black, illiterate (nearly always, since it was a crime to teach slaves to read in most slave states) former slaves of crimes was pretty easy in the former slave states. For example, most former slaves were pretty much instantly guilty of vagrancy. Chain gangs and forced prison labor persisted well until... well, now actually.
Then there's the civil rights situation. Despite the passage of the 13th amendment (ratified by Mississippi in 1995), Jim Crow laws persisted until 1965 and anti-miscegenation laws weren't declared unconstitutional until 1967 and weren't all repealed until Alabama finally did so in 2001. So, there are plenty of people alive today who experienced active legal discrimination in their lifetimes.
Given all that, it's ridiculous to claim that the past racial discrimination of the US is just a "crutch or excuse" for social problems. The kind of effects that sort of thing produces can persist across numerous generations.
As for people starting with nothing then rising to great success, that certainly is possible, but those are statistical outliers. If you're going to consider people en masse then those born to disadvantaged circumstances are going to stay disadvantaged and pass it on to their children and their children's children.
Re: (Score:3)
As for people starting with nothing then rising to great success, that certainly is possible, but those are statistical outliers. If you're going to consider people en masse then those born to disadvantaged circumstances are going to stay disadvantaged and pass it on to their children and their children's children.
I fully agree.
And for the "equal opportunity": The social mobility (which is a direct measure for the aboundance of 'from poverty to wealth' stories) in the U.S. is not higher than in the oh so socialist european countries. And in Europe, the most common from poverty to wealth story is 'has won the lottery'. So how's the "equal opportunity" going, if playing the lottery gives you better chances than hard and steady work?
No, the wealth on both sides of the Atlantic creates an aristocracy, and with it an ideo
Re: (Score:2)
In other words, the plural of anecdote is not data. The myth of the self-made-man is very strongly prevalent in the USA because the country has largely been built from scratch on a rather short timescale that produced genuine examples of people who seized chanceful opportunities. And I'm not implying they had no talent. But it was never JUST talent. And I go as far as to say it's NEVER just talent.
Spectacular economical successes tend to overshadow the fact that most intellectual breakthroughs are increment
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sorry but economic oppression is much harder when you teach people that all they have to do to
Re: (Score:3)
If you convince the downtrodden that they have no hope to get ahead in a country where gun ownership is a right, you get an armed revolt. If you teach them that they can get ahead if they keep themselves too busy to think about revolt, you get a bunch of worn out poor people who aren't quite ready to give up yet.
Scratch the surface of those rags to CEO stories and you'll usually find out the rags were designer originals. With a population over 300 million, you will find a few statistical outliers that actua
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Genetic diversity... (Score:5, Interesting)
The argument of the paper is *NOT* that there is a genetic driver to culture. The argument is that genetics is a useful *proxy* for culture, and one on which there is much clearer data. Most culture is strongly influenced by your family, who also happen to be your genetic influences. If you can track genetics you can also track culture.
For example - immigrants from Sweden to the US are going to have similar genetics to people who remained in Sweden. But they are also going to bring their culture with them as well, which is going to continue to influence their lifestyles significantly.
It is very hard to get data on how many people in the US have similar cultural influences to Sweden, but it is much less hard to find the people who have a genetic link to it, and therefore have an increased probability of having similar cultural influence.
You don't have to make any claim at all about genetic influences over cultural ones for this to be a useful line of study.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Um... that race wasn't even allowed to vote in every state until recently. Most of their grandparents couldn't even work the worst jobs in society because of discrimination. The fact that their grand children aren't running the country yet should be a given... oh wait.
yeah because if there is a black president it means that black people are running the country.
Re: (Score:2)
Uh, if I did your study in the US and released my numbers, the newspaper headline would be "Study Finds Blacks Poorer than Whites". I don't think I'd get raked over any coals for that.
You start getting into hot water when you talk about causes. Your study would just demonstrate an easily visible fact, and doesn't prove or really even suggest anything
Re: (Score:2)
First off, fuck you.
Secondly, "those people" were brought here as slaves and worse had their culture, religion and family ties methodically and deliberately destroyed. Those would be the same culture, religion and family values which Republicans and conservatives claim as the essence of civilization and which, if they're impinged upon in the least by the state (not to mention "slave owners"), will immediately cause our culture to explode from within.
Then they endured over 100 years of outright written
Re: (Score:3)
In 1955 90% of black families had a father in the house. That was after most of the bad things you list but before some idiot decided that not having a man in the house was a good requirement for families to get aid. Facts cannot be racist.
Re: (Score:3)
I have to disagree.
I've lived in Utah, Wyoming, and Connecticut before moving to Texas and I gotta say there is a shit ton of racists in Connecticut.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
I have seen as much or MORE racism in the north than I see here in the south. The KKK may run around in the south (but most southerners wish they would go away), but the Neo-Nazis are in the north.
Re: (Score:2)
I've yet to run into any KKK activity in any of the southern states I have lived in.
They may be around, but it isn't like they present themselves in public really.....if they every had a public rally anywhere down here in the sheets (or even without really, but with signs, etc), I'm sure it would make the news.....and you just don't see it.
Re: (Score:2)
They aren't all that common these days, and their activity isn't all that overt, but they are here. Just like you don't see a lot of goose stepping in PA but the Neo-Nazis are there.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No, you miss the point. I'll illustrate.
Verifiable fact: there are more black people in jail than whites in the US.
Said such a thing one, time, instantly branded racist. But you will note that the statement makes no claims about who commits more crimes, about whether more black people actually get charged or found guilty vs non-blacks where were not charged or found innocent, whether the number is a raw total, or a ratio of population at large.... ...it just states the current state of jail population. no c
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No, you're not necessarily a racist, you just don't know statistics.
Verifiable fact: there are more poor people in jail than non-poor in the US. There is a much larger correlation between economic status and crime than there is between race and crime.
So, the fact that you "illustrated" this, shows one of a few possibilities. 1) you were unaware of this tighter correlation. 2) you are aware of this correlation, but don't believe it. (why?) 3) you are aware of this correlation, but don't understand it, a
Re:Muddy Water to start with (Score:4, Insightful)
Many people learned to read science books because it was first considered important for them to be able to read holy books. Universities started off as not much more than seminaries.
Being someone who has read both holy books and science books, I'd say that the real cause of people having problems with science is either that they are uninterested or unable to read. Holy books don't really impinge too much on my reading of journals.
Re: (Score:2)
A person forced to read a holy book instead of a science book probably won't be much help developing the next IPhone,
Well yes, if the science books are banned by the theocracy. But are science books and tech manuals all you read? I read the bible, science fiction, other fiction, nonfiction. Reading a bible doesn't stop you from learning.
Re: (Score:2)
A country can be very diverse and successful. Consider Canada and Singapore.
A country can be racially pure and successful. Consider Denmark and Switzerland (yes I realize they have four languages but they haven't had any immigration for a long time).
Success is cyclic. Today's world beating country is tomorrow's basket case. The Soviet Union was very diverse. It was one of the world's two super powers. Then it was a basket case. Now a more racially pure Russia climbing out of its hole. Similarly Japan. It is very racially pure. It was one of the strongest economies in the world. Now it appears to be on its way down.
For every example one way, there is an example the other way. The study is bunk.
I think this is one of the more cogent responses of the issue. If the thesis of the study is that 'genetic diversity influences economic viability' then you are trying to correlate at least two variables that have had widely disparate values over time and fluctuate on different time scales (hundreds, if not thousands of years for genetics, years for economies). If you did this study 30 years ago when the genetics were probably the same and the economic indicators were different, what kind of result are yo
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Aksum#section_6 [wikipedia.org]
Re:There is obviously a link here. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes. The world's longest-lived and wealthiest societies in all of history prove your thesis. NOT!
Egypt commanded through 3 principal epochs - over 3000 years of culturally continuous and reasonably enlightened civilization, outstripping the dreams of wealth in over that period.
They were able to accomplish this without your revolting melanin-deficiency.
This is but one example. Somehow, northern barbarians - who until a few short centuries ago, slept in the straw, still matted with their own dinner-filth - think they are the center of the universe. The maths and science they inherited from central and south asia have been used to rip the planet to shreds. Then they blame the victim as proof of their moral superiority.
Pathetic.
Re: (Score:2)
The ancient Egyptians had mind-boggling knowledge of astronomy, geometry - they knew pi, zero, the golden section - as well as a highly developed cursive script, and construction techniques that we still can't get anywhere near today.
I'm guess what I'm saying is that economic measures are already biased; the global economic structures currently in force are products o
Re: (Score:2)
And uses economic means for post-colonial extraction and suppression of material from resource-rich populations, without requisite compensation.
It calls this "development".
Re: (Score:2)
So the Scandinavian countries and the UK should be home to the superpowers and the US should be lagging far behind, with Australia being a poverty-ridden hellhole, right? Native Americans aren't a bunch of pasty white folks...
FIGHT! (Score:3)
Between a pseudo-science and an immature discipline!
Re: (Score:2)
Re:There is obviously a link here. (Score:4, Informative)
East Africa was literate a millennium before Europe.
North Africa and West Asia invented literacy.
Re: (Score:2)
but they forgot the vowels!
As for East Africa, that is Ethiopia, their writing system is not older than Linear A, for sure.
Re: (Score:3)
It is a common error to attribute Achaeans - and the Dorians, too, really - to "Europe". One may do so, based on the southeastern-most hump of that continent, surely.
But the intellectual world in which they were grown, and the tradition they embellished and elevated was not indigenous to the Balkans. It was rather a part of the Indo-Aryan world, which acquired a unique synthesis of Egyptian, Levantine and Mesopotamian influences.
"Greece" as it was understood as the Hellenic world? As much a part of Asia
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure what developing a written language has to do with not being able to trade in the same markets or largely being relegated to tribal survival, being a laborer, or servant for someone else. The oppression isn't limited to coming from Europeans either. Class systems and corruption in even democratic governments can cause oppression when it's result is subjugating the majority of the populace.
Re: (Score:3)
NOT Flamebait!
While there may be a study of economics out there, the field's leading representatives have become wholly wrapped up in politics. Those representatives are so thoroughly beholden to the political powers that be that they will say nearly ANYTHING to support the existing policies even where the supporting theory is obviously non-viable.
Imagine Carl Sagan talking about the beauty of a million epicycles all different with no rhyme or reason and what a fine sort of matter the crystal spheres must b
Re: (Score:2)