People need to focus on individual rights, not group rights. Focussing on equal outcomes invariably leads to individual injustice as groups tend to perform differently. For instance, in Dan Seligman's book 'A Question of Intelligence' he notes that East Asians tend to outperform whites on non-verbal elements in the tests (whether taken in the US, Asia, or the UK & also when adopted by non Asian families). So, expecting whites to be as represented in math/science professions per population seems unrealistic. Likewise, Ashkenazi Jews consistently score above average on psychometric tests. Not every group is going to be represented in the professions to the same extent. There is, however, overlap amongst groups so you can't imply much about an individual based on a group average.
This is why insisting on equal outcomes rather than equal opportunity is beating up against human nature & evolution.
People need to focus on individual rights, not group rights. Focussing on equal outcomes invariably leads to individual injustice as groups tend to perform differently. For instance, in Dan Seligman's book 'A Question of Intelligence' he notes that East Asians tend to outperform whites on non-verbal elements in the tests (whether taken in the US, Asia, or the UK & also when adopted by non Asian families). So, expecting whites to be as represented in math/science professions per population seems unrealistic. Likewise, Ashkenazi Jews consistently score above average on psychometric tests. Not every group is going to be represented in the professions to the same extent. There is, however, overlap amongst groups so you can't imply much about an individual based on a group average.
ReplyDeleteThis is why insisting on equal outcomes rather than equal opportunity is beating up against human nature & evolution.
http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/10/james-watson-tells-inconvenient-truth_296.php
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2008/01/no-scientific-basis-for-race.html