Peterson's 12 Rules For Life, have you heard of this?

[bennyboy]

I'm still waiting for the link showing that in Low-SES IQ is only 10% heritable. *holds breath*

Also: please learn what "control group" means. In this case, it matters.

[Rev. Rye]

Haha, you spent your time of your own volition and didn’t respect him to begin with. This thread should’ve been split. Too late now.

Yeah, what would you even call this thread? Bennyboy vs. Khem, Tizh, and Rev. Rye (who at one point debates Tizh about the merits of a cynical attitude towards both extremes of the political system)? Honestly, it's devolved from a discussion over the merits of (for better or for much, MUCH, worse) one of the most public intellectuals today into a thread calling out Bennyboy for buying into his bullshit.

[Whateverist]

Haha, you spent your time of your own volition and didn’t respect him to begin with. This thread should’ve been split. Too late now.

Yeah, what would you even call this thread? Bennyboy vs. Khem, Tizh, and Rev. Rye (who at one point debates Tizh about the merits of a cynical attitude towards both extremes of the political system)? Honestly, it's devolved from a discussion over the merits of (for better or for much, MUCH, worse) one of the most public intellectuals today into a thread calling out Bennyboy for buying into his bullshit.

I wonder how much he paid?

[bennyboy]

Let's examine some of Peterson's "bullshit," shall we?  I'd like to post a recent video clip.  I've taken the time to type out a section for purpose of discussion.

So what's the left for?  The left is to remind those who are benefiting from the hierarchies that the hierarchy comes at a cost-- and the cost is the clumping of people at the bottom, and that that's an eternal cost, and it's NOT TRIVIAL.  And so that's what the left should be properly focused on.  The left should be providing the voice of those who are dispossessed by hierarchies and the right should be saying yeah but the damn hierarchies are necessary, and they're not only necessary but they're also productive.

Then the left says yes, but they tilt towards tyranny, and they can be occupied inappropriately by people who are playing games of power.  Fair enough-- the right has to take that into account.  The hierarchy can rigidify, and is likely to do that, and it can be taken over by people who are corrupt-- and that's likely to happen.

It seems like a pretty balanced view to me. Is this really what alt-right White Supremacists sound like?

I'm quite curious, actually, what exactly anybody here finds exceptional.  Robvalue took the time to type out a passage from the book, and that was very interesting, but that was the end, so far as I can tell, of any attempt to actual examine what Peterson believes, or even what he has said.

[The Grand Nudger]

That Peterson manages to talk about other things isn't much of a pass on those moments when he decides to spread conspiracy theories about cyrpto marxists trying to kill free speech dead (they aren't) or that white privilege is a non thing (it is), or that lobsters make cogent comment of social hierarchies vis-a-vis gender and race gaps (they don't) or that the painful anxieties felt by a subset of young white men should lead to a softening of anyone's stance or language on race or gender issues (fuck em).  

It's not his filler that's a problem, except insomuch as this filler is part of the legitimizing device of his internet persona. That someone might say some given thing in a softer way does not mean that the idea is qualitatively different than the vulgar and overt things that we've long since pushed to the fringes of acceptability, nor..for that matter...does a person have to be a hood wearing klansman to transport those ideas from one place to the next.

That Peterson's missteps are entirely predictable in light of his traditionalist bent isn't something that escapes a critical reading (or his contemporaries) and insomuch as conservative ideology has been coopted by white supremacy or the normalization of white supremacy he will be invariably forced to make excuses for it regardless of whether he, personally..is a racist or not.

Which he eagerly does.

(even the seemingly innocuous comment above misses the mark so completely a person might wonder how a smart guy could fuck the pooch so hard)

[bennyboy]

I'm still waiting for that link to the 10% heritability of IQ. Because if it's true, then almost the entire problem in the US is that we haven't bothered to provide black kids with a good enough environment. This is a highly solvable problem, and would change my depressed view on the IQ issue greatly. It is, in fact, what I had expected to find-- at which point, I was going to suggest that IQ was probably also related to productivity, and that any money invested in improving the environment for black kids would probably raise the GDP enough to make the investment self-sustaining: i.e. that certain kinds of welfare assistance would be a win-win.

Now, let's look at some of your current points, because Peterson's talked enough about them for you to make a great case. A couple of quotes, and we're done, I'd suspect. What, exactly, does Peterson say about lobsters "vis-a-vis gender and race gaps"? I suspect he HAS said something, and I'm going to go through the exact some process I always have been-- attempt to find unbiased statistical facts which support or refute whatever claim he's making.

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm still waiting for that link to the 10% heritability of IQ.  Because if it's true, then almost the entire problem in the US is that we haven't bothered to provide black kids with a good enough environment.

Yeah, it's almost as if segregation and systematic institutional racism don't provide adequate opportunity for learning the types of skills that IQ tests measure, or something.

We -could- solve it....but then again, black poverty is inevitable so why would we waste our time. They should stop being lazy and Git Productive - that would fix everything. I said bale that cotton boy, not hug it.



We could go even further down the rabit hole, though, and point out that even saying "race and iq" is ignorant from the outset..it flew 70 years ago but now we talk about genetics and IQ, and the funny thing about that is that race is kind of silly in context.

[Shell B]

What cracks me up is that some of what benny says isn't even that bad, and even makes sense, but because he generally trends toward the "baddie" side of the political spectrum, he's quickly lambasted for everything he says. We all bring so much of our prior interactions with each other into every conversation. It's interesting to watch. By interesting, I mean it's like watching paint dry, which is not to say I'm not guilty too.

[Amarok]

Not that bad to who?

[bennyboy]

I'm still waiting for that link to the 10% heritability of IQ.  Because if it's true, then almost the entire problem in the US is that we haven't bothered to provide black kids with a good enough environment.

Yeah, it's almost as if segregation and systematic institutional racism don't provide adequate opportunity for learning the types of skills that IQ tests measure, or something.

We -could- solve it....but then again, black poverty is inevitable so why would we waste our time.  They should stop being lazy and Git Productive - that would fix everything.  I said bale that cotton boy, not hug it.



We could go even further down the rabit hole, though, and point out that even saying "race and iq" is ignorant from the outset..it flew 70 years ago but now we talk about genetics and IQ, and the funny thing about that is that race is kind of silly in context.

. . . still waiting for you to cite that source.

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Yeah, it's almost as if segregation and systematic institutional racism don't provide adequate opportunity for learning the types of skills that IQ tests measure, or something.

You're saying what I said, right up front, when I introduced the demographic numbers on IQ.  I'm perfectly open to evidence that it is lack of educational opportunity that is mainly responsible for IQ differences.

In some metrics, black people at least in the US, clearly ARE inferior-- in average IQ scores for example. Then we have to ask why-- is it because the IQ tests are biased toward white participants? Or because socioeconomic conditions lead to bad education? Or because of differential intelligences (intellectual tasks vs. social skills vs. physical intelligence), and only a narrow range of those being tested?

And then, we have to ask-- EVEN IF there are actual racial differences, should it matter at all with regard to rights of citizenship? I'd certainly argue not.

Yeah, I'm practically just repeating the white supremacist mantra here, hey?  Because those guys always like to open the door to multiple possibilities that would discredit their interpretation of the data?

Seems legit.

---

What cracks me up is that some of what benny says isn't even that bad, and even makes sense, but because he generally trends toward the "baddie" side of the political spectrum, he's quickly lambasted for everything he says. We all bring so much of our prior interactions with each other into every conversation. It's interesting to watch. By interesting, I mean it's like watching paint dry, which is not to say I'm not guilty too.

The sad thing is that I consider myself solidly left of center.  I'm fully for gay marriage, pro-choice, better welfare, affordable health care, anti-gun.

I just don't happen to think that truth can be created by an ideological narrative, no matter how well-intentioned.  No good outcome will be the result of a fairy tale that neglects to inform itself through a careful collection of facts.