Avoids the question. Please answer it.

Mitchel

-----Original Message-----
>From: Eric Entemann <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Feb 20, 2007 8:22 AM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Anti-Science Left
>
>I most likely would have died in early childhood had the nascent fascist
>pharmaceutical industry not supplied my doctor with penicillin.
>
>----Original Message Follows----
>From: Jonathan Campbell <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: Science for the People Discussion List
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Anti-Science Left
>Date: Tue, 20 Feb 2007 07:59:07 -0500
>
>Michael,
>
>So, a theory by Monsanto that it's OK to feed us frankenfood is OK, but a
>theory that heart disease is caused by a nutrient deficiency (for instance)
>is crackpot. Give me a break. I challenge you to find a single SENTENCE that
>is incorrect in Pauling and Rath's paper. (I won't even get into possible
>co-factors of AIDS such as HHV-6A).
>
>Disparagement and marginalization are the essence of writers for the cult of
>mainstream science, and whatever the pharmaceutical industry doles out to us
>is the best thing since sliced bread (until it kills people wholesale, like
>Vioxx).
>
>Do you support genetic engineering of food, or do you not?
>
>Jonathan
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Michael Balter
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 5:40 AM
> Subject: Re: Anti-Science Left
>
>
> By the way, since concern has been expressed on this list about methods
>of argumentation and personal attacks, let me be clear: I do not consider
>Jonathan's post about my Science connection to be a personal attack, but a
>legitimate political attack on my credibility as a commentator on science
>related issues from a left perspective. If I worked for Exxon, that would
>certainly be relevant to my credibility if the subject of global warming
>came up here. I have defended myself against this political attack, that is
>all. Likewise, it is a political and not a personal attack if I say that
>Jonathan's peddling of crackpot theories discredits the left and its
>influence in the wider population, especially when they are disseminated
>publicly.
>
> MB
>
>
> On 2/20/07, Michael Balter <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Other than saying that I was a member of Science for the People during
>most of its existence as an organization and that a quick look at the
>"Civilization's Discontents" segment of the News section of my Web site will
>make my personal politics clear, I will leave it to others to comment on
>whether my association with Science disqualifies me from commenting on
>science from a left perspective.
>
> www.michaelbalter.com
>
>
>
>
> On 2/20/07, Jonathan Campbell <[log in to unmask] > wrote:
> This is so ironic.
>
> SESPA and Science For The People arose as a challenge to the
>corporate use of science that was representative, at the time, of the AAAS
>and its magazine, Science. Here we have an author from - of all magazines -
>Science, who disparages anyone who criticizes anything that is generally
>accepted by the very mainstream science that SftP challenged.
>
> Does anyone else see the irony of this situation? Mr. Balter is Mr.
>Science Establishment. You can't get any closer to the polar opposite of
>what SftP was. It would be interesting to find out Mr. Balter's opinion on,
>say, genetic engineering of food using antibiotic resistance marker
>technology, RR soybeans, BT and RR corn, etc. His early article in the
>International Herald seems rather uncritical:
>http://www.iht.com/articles/1991/12/19/inst.php
>
> Jonathan
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Michael Balter
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 2:02 AM
> Subject: Re: Anti-Science Left
>
>
> Robert, thanks for this, very helpful. By the way, over the past
>year or so those who believe in a race/IQ connection have gotten very
>excited about the findings of University of Chicago geneticist Bruce Lahn's
>publication in my own journal, Science, of genes possibly linked to human
>cognition, under recent natural selection, and which have an allele
>distribution suggesting Africans are disadvantaged (microcephalin and ASPM.)
>Many here may have followed this. In December I wrote a profile of Lahn for
>Science which raised the social and political issues with a sidebar looking
>at recent scientific challenges to these interpretations. The articles can
>be found here: Science 22 December 2006: Vol. 314. no. 5807, pp. 1871 -
>1873. But if anyone does not have access to Science online and wants to
>email me offlist, I will be happy to send the pdfs.
>
> best, Michael
>
>
> On 2/20/07, Robt Mann <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> José Morales has opened an important theme.
> But in doing so he wrote:
>
>
> ...
>
>
> my thesis advisor ... asked me what if researchers had
>completed a study and found that white people were of superior intelligence
>to people of color, would I believe the conclusions? What if the study was
>rock solid, completely water tight. Then I went through a series of
>questions and caveats and he replied yes this study took that into account.
>Ultimately, the idea was that all possible criticisms from all corners
>(people of color, civil libertarians etc.) were taken into account and
>controlled for. Would I believe it? I said, well if all these possible
>concerns and questions were taken into account and controlled for, I'd have
>to believe that all white people are of superior intelligence to all people
>of color. He said, OK you will be a good scientist.
>
>
> José's msg doesn't look generally careless or unexamined,
>so I take this as he states it.
>
> The idea that 'white people were of superior intelligence
>to people of color' rocketed to prominence while I was a grad student at
>Berkeley, where education prof Arthur Jensen stated it (in the form of a
>difference in IQ medians &/or means &/or modes - any or all will serve
>for present purposes, I suppose - between some whites and some
>Afro-Americans). The nature of this contention, and of the conclusions from
>all the IQ measures which were purged from the Stanford-Binet IQ test suite
>if they showed any difference between men and women, is overlapping
>distributions with different means.
> Has anyone said 'all white people are of superior
>intelligence to all people of color' - at least during the past century or
>so? Is the assertion deserving of serious discussion these days? Everyone
>who has experienced a sample >100 of each knows the most stupid whites are
>far less intelligent than a clever non-white. The notion of any race whose
>intelligence distribution fails to overlap those of all other races is
>contrary to obvious fact.
> Similarly, the slogan 'the Slavs are sub-human' is
>obviously false. But it was a major defining slogan of the Nazi party,
>which you had to assent to if you wanted the social security that was
>available in Germany for a decade by open adherence to that party. I
>postulate that it's in the nature of totalitarian systems to require assent
>to slogans which are not subtly but flagrantly false &/or immoral.
> What José says he would assent to if research concluded
>it rock-solidly is known to every experienced adult, whether educated or
>not, to be false. I am loath to believe that he or anyone else on this list
>could ever assent to it, whether or not some scientists had asserted it with
>whatever authority & 'evidence'.
> I focus on this slide from 'race W is, on average, of
>superior intelligence to race C' to 'all people of race W are of superior
>intelligence to all people of race C' because this same fallacy often occurs
>in polemics about sexism. In my experience, even when the postulated
>distributions are drawn with very large extents of overlap (on a paper
>napkin at lunch in a U staff club), fanatical wimminsLibbers are capable of
>promptly threatening violence, complaining as if what had been asserted was
>'all men are of superior intelligence to all women'. Such a raver is
>immediately escorted out of the building, but when outside fails to give any
>excuse for decking her. I have seen that mode of argumentation countless
>times, which is why it interests me now when it comes from José (wrt race
>not sex).
>
> BTW supposing the Jensen/Shockley-type conclusion had
>been proven, wouldn't it follow that the disadvantaged group should get
>special help in education, medicine, nutrition, ... ? That was my
>response 4 decades ago when those who fancied themselves as radicals
>vilified Jensen (of whose work I knew nothing else); and is still my answer.
> Racial differences entailed in sickle-cell anaemia should be admitted
>(when proven), and acted upon. It is not racist to say so. Why is
>intelligence utterly different?
> I must add that I'm very sceptical of IQ and far from
>convinced that the Jensen conclusion describes anything important. But
>since José has postulated the condition of its being thoroughly meaningful &
>proven, I want to respond on his reaction to that imagined state of affairs.
>
>
> If what José said was, instead, an oversight in his
>writing, then I would like to hear discussion of psychological patterns of
>this type, which can cause a certain amount of misunderstanding & trouble.
>
>
> R
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> --
> www.michaelbalter.com
>
> ******************************************
> Michael Balter
> Contributing Correspondent, Science
> [log in to unmask]
> ******************************************
>
>
>
> --
> www.michaelbalter.com
>
> ******************************************
> Michael Balter
> Contributing Correspondent, Science
> [log in to unmask]
> ******************************************
>
>
>
> --
> www.michaelbalter.com
>
> ******************************************
> Michael Balter
> Contributing Correspondent, Science
> [log in to unmask]
> ******************************************
>
>_________________________________________________________________
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