Re: Is my CS instructor nuts?

In article <1150676570.962112.235180@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
spinoza1111@xxxxxxxxx says...
Gerry Quinn wrote:

As I posted elsewhere in the thread just now, Giles' reported
description of events do not entirely coincide with those of RAFO.

Now you libel Giles by posting a negative fact without argument which
will later found to be either a symptom of your illiteracy or your
dishonesty, since in the latter case, you will rely on your auditors'
inability to renarrate...to even comprehend the concept of
"constructive" termination. I've explained it to you but you don't
understand.

Nope, I just made an observation which indicates that even if Giles and
RAFO have the whole truth between them, which seems unlikely, they do
not themselves appear to agree precisely on the facts.

Gee alert the media...Bubba here has discovered that despite the
consensus of modern biologists that human beings constitute one
species, homo sapiens sapiens, there are "innate" differences which are
"well supported"...which if innate would constitute the need to rewrite
even those biology texts which don't address the issue, but merely
contain a single species entry for all humans alive today.

That human beings constitute one species has never been in serious
dispute. That, however, is not the assertion you made. You are
claiming that unlike other species, humankind does not express sexual
dimorphism, or variations between geographic lineages. This claim is
palpable untrue.

"Variations" have been consistently used by undereducated scientists to
conclude that policies should recognize these "variations" including
immigration "reform" and racist IQ testing.

However, these "variations" are statistical and so feeble as to be in
fact unscientific as a predictor of the abilities of any one human
being, therefore their application is a violation of human rights.

ALL measurements are statistical - and the evidence of genetic
variation between geographical lineages of the human species is utterly
overwhelming. Are you genuinely attempting to deny that the obvious
inherited differences in colour and body shape - the physically obvious
differences that have been noted since prehistory - don't exist? Of
course there are numerous less directly obvious variations too - blood
group, lactose tolerance, etc.

Or are you asserting that these may exist, but some force prevents
inherited factors having an influence on specific other phenotypical
properties? What force might this be? And why are statistical
variations found even after its presumed operation?

A person who speaks of "variations" is a racist because he's addressing
a phenomenon which has so many cofactors, including such historically
confirmable cofactors as the brutalization of Africa by Europe, that
any talk based on that phenomenon is bull***.

It seems we must choose between being 'racists' according to your
individualistic definition of the term (which apparently includes
recognition of the fact of racial variation), and being liars. [Or, if
we are not liars, clinically insane.]

Human beings share the same genome, therefore "variations", even if
observed and confirmed under controlled conditions (an impossibility
given self-reflexivity, that is the knowledge of the observer that
she's being observed, an impossibility given history which means that
no starting conditions exist) have no explanation EXCEPT, in the case
of negative variations, history in the form of colonialist and other
forms of oppression, and no predictive value because fortunately,
colonialism is not a given.

If the expression 'genome' is used in the sense incorporating the
variations shared by the human race, then humans share the same genome.
But obviously this does not in any way contradict the notion of
variation!

The Hong Kong education authoriries and the British educational rules
REQUIRE that the text and the class discuss the issue of innate racial
differences in biology classes and, based on established scientific
results ("theories" only in the professional's sense of "true theories,
with evidence, that like Newton's laws will not be so much superseded
or outmoded as incorporated in a more encompassing theory") these
systems require the teacher to reject all talk of "innate" differences.

The Hong Kong and UK education authorities are at liberty to prescribe
what is to be taught in schools, whether it be true or false.
[Erstwhile, we were discussing whether the authorities at Roosevelt
University have related, though more restricted rights.]

However, it is not given to these authorities to adjudicate on what is
or is not scientific fact. By standard definitions of science, nobody
can.

Note, incidentally, that the actual content of the paragraph above
indicates not that the HK authorities discuss the issue of innate
differences, but that they prohibit discussion of the issue.

We already know that American biological education has been moronized
given Creationism, so perhaps it is permitted to be silent on the
interpretation of biological data. Of course, the "apolitical" teacher
then, precisely because she is "apolitical" knuckles under to the
requirement that she teach Creationism. Human nature, including the
human nature of morons and thugs, abhors a vacuum.

Indeed, mandatory teaching of creationism or evolution are other
examples of how educational authorities may prescribe what is to be
taught in schools - but cannot thereby cause their prescriptions to
rewrite science.

Secondly, even in the hardest of sciences, silence==death. Absent a
discussion of the politics of evolution in biology, teachers are
defenseless against Creationism.

Ironic, but perhaps you intend it, because you refer to the politics
rather than the science of evolution. Just like the creationists, you
believe that evolution does not apply to the human species; that it
stopped when our species diverged from other hominids. [You propose
this for political rather than religious reasons. This gives you a
problem - religious anti-evolutionists can at least assert that the
purported cessation or non-existence of evolution is the work of an
omnipotent named entity, whereas anti-evolutionists of the political
kind can only bluster and shriek and attempt to change the subject.]

Oh, so perhaps you believe that white geeks represent a higher form of
humanity?

'Higher' expresses a moral or aesthethic rather than a scientific
judgement - if I were to make that claim I would have to justify it on
grounds unrelated to science. And in fact I do not make it, nor do I
believe it. I do believe that the the average values of many human
qualities we value vary between the geographical lineages, with no
lineage having pre-eminence in all or even most.

Someone who valued the qualities possessed by 'white geeks' (whatever
they are) above all others would probably believe that white geeks
represented a higher form of humanity. As would somebody who believed
that white geeks possessed all desirable qualities in special
abundance. Both - irrespective of the correctness or otherwise of
their judgements - would be described as 'racists' in the conventional
sense of the word, in that they make moral distinctions between
identified races.

[Logically, both descriptions could entail equivalent sets of views - I
distinguish between them on the basis that the qualities they value
most may differ, and that insofar as their beliefs are honestly come
by, one might attempt to alter those of the former by means of moral
argument, and those of the latter by empirical argument.]

(1) Stephen Jay Gould shows us that evolution can go back. Are we not
men? We are Devo!

Jay Gould was mostly famous for a theory of sudden evolutionary jumps,
nowadays in less favour. He is a poor name to bring up, as his
contributions to the debate on human variation were often dishonest.

(2) Given our knowledge of the genome, if there was any evidence for
evolution within homo sapiens sapiens, I'm sure it would be like
details at eleven. Unfortunately for you it is not. All you have is
statistical evidence which has to be interpreted by thugs and morons
ignorant of colonialism to lend ANY weight to ANY claim of further
evolution.

As I've said before, ALL evidence is statistical. For those interested
in science, it IS like 'details at eleven'. [I presume you mean
evidence about particular evolutionary matters - the fact that humans
have evolved and will continue to evolve is undisputed among scientists
other than those committed to 'intelligent design', and perhaps a few
other cranks.]

(3) God forbid you should teach biology.

Perhaps the Hong Kong education authorities would forbid me from
teaching biology. But that doesn't say anything about biology.
Let me note, however, that I started off by saying precisely that this
subject was likely to be unsuited to introductory biology classes, just
as Zionism is unsuited to introductory courses on world religion.
Among the ignorant, discussion would generate more heat than light -
since many are wilfully ignorant, these subjects are difficult to
discuss even when a substantial shared body of knowledge is available
to all participants, but there may at least be a chance of progress.


- Gerry Quinn







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