I know a lot about how Republicans think and was a Republican candidate for the Massachusetts State Senate. Many Republicans think that Palin is smarter than Biden.
If gene analysis could somehow tell us definitively that Sarah Palin had an IQ of 90 and Joe Biden had an IQ of 130, would that change your political opinions or your vote in the last election? Do you think it would change the opinion of a substantial number of Republicans?
I submit that this is actually a testable proposition. Sample 100 people from a country where English is taught well, but the political system is so different from the US that people are unlikely to have tribal predispositions to favor Democrats or Republicans (100 Singaporeans, maybe). Show them the Palin-Biden debate, and a couple of examples of each of them speaking impromptu. Then ask the respondents whom they think is more intelligent. How substantial a sum would you be willing to wager that Palin would win such a poll?
I understand that they hold that view, and I am not trying to argue in favor of my own opposing view. What I’m saying is that, inasmuch as I do hold an opposing view (which is also tied in with political ideology, identity politics, and so forth), I’m really unlikely to be persuaded to change my mind on the basis of DNA evidence for intelligence. And I’m arguing that nearly everyone is just like me in this respect (again, modulo their own political views).
Would learning that your favorite presidential candidate had genes predisposing him to being a sociopath make you less likely to vote for that candidate?
Would learning that your favorite presidential candidate had genes predisposing him to being a sociopath make you less likely to vote for that candidate?
It would, at least a bit. But I’d have to consider it alongside the other stuff I knew about the candidate. If some candidate had attained the office of, let’s say, the governor of a large state while reliably carrying out my policy preferences and not getting embroiled in a major scandal of some kind, I doubt I’d give much credence to the hypothesis that they’d controlled their sociopathic urges, biding their time until they were elected US President and then unleashed terror upon the populace. Also note that there are enough veto points within the structure of the US government to prevent any one person from carrying out Stalin-level genocide or whatever; your point would maybe stand a bit better if we were electing a dictator, but then, dictators don’t get elected.
I guess they very occasionally do, and in that case, I would be somewhat more wary about voting for someone with this fabled 70%-chance-of-being-a-sociopath DNA test even if they otherwise had given me no particular cause for alarm. We’re not talking about a very common situation here, though.
Selection bias alert! One can’t become a Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Kim Il-sung or Pol Pot without power in the first place, so even if potential megakillers were actually much less common among powerful people we would still expect disproportionately more megakillers among the powerful.
A whole, whole, whole lot of people have held political power other than those guys, and with very few exceptions have restrained themselves from committing mass murder.
But the expect cost of a sociopath becoming the U.S. president is huge. Also, although I don’t agree with this, lots of people think that George Bush was a mass murderer.
I know a lot about how Republicans think and was a Republican candidate for the Massachusetts State Senate. Many Republicans think that Palin is smarter than Biden.
If gene analysis could somehow tell us definitively that Sarah Palin had an IQ of 90 and Joe Biden had an IQ of 130, would that change your political opinions or your vote in the last election? Do you think it would change the opinion of a substantial number of Republicans?
I submit that this is actually a testable proposition. Sample 100 people from a country where English is taught well, but the political system is so different from the US that people are unlikely to have tribal predispositions to favor Democrats or Republicans (100 Singaporeans, maybe). Show them the Palin-Biden debate, and a couple of examples of each of them speaking impromptu. Then ask the respondents whom they think is more intelligent. How substantial a sum would you be willing to wager that Palin would win such a poll?
I understand that they hold that view, and I am not trying to argue in favor of my own opposing view. What I’m saying is that, inasmuch as I do hold an opposing view (which is also tied in with political ideology, identity politics, and so forth), I’m really unlikely to be persuaded to change my mind on the basis of DNA evidence for intelligence. And I’m arguing that nearly everyone is just like me in this respect (again, modulo their own political views).
Would learning that your favorite presidential candidate had genes predisposing him to being a sociopath make you less likely to vote for that candidate?
Yes, definitely.
It would, at least a bit. But I’d have to consider it alongside the other stuff I knew about the candidate. If some candidate had attained the office of, let’s say, the governor of a large state while reliably carrying out my policy preferences and not getting embroiled in a major scandal of some kind, I doubt I’d give much credence to the hypothesis that they’d controlled their sociopathic urges, biding their time until they were elected US President and then unleashed terror upon the populace. Also note that there are enough veto points within the structure of the US government to prevent any one person from carrying out Stalin-level genocide or whatever; your point would maybe stand a bit better if we were electing a dictator, but then, dictators don’t get elected.
Sometimes they do!
I guess they very occasionally do, and in that case, I would be somewhat more wary about voting for someone with this fabled 70%-chance-of-being-a-sociopath DNA test even if they otherwise had given me no particular cause for alarm. We’re not talking about a very common situation here, though.
Don’t the names Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Kim Il-sung and Pol Pot cause you to think that something about power attracts the wrong kind of people.
Selection bias alert! One can’t become a Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Kim Il-sung or Pol Pot without power in the first place, so even if potential megakillers were actually much less common among powerful people we would still expect disproportionately more megakillers among the powerful.
I believe this is a matter of some dispute.
A whole, whole, whole lot of people have held political power other than those guys, and with very few exceptions have restrained themselves from committing mass murder.
But the expect cost of a sociopath becoming the U.S. president is huge. Also, although I don’t agree with this, lots of people think that George Bush was a mass murderer.
How less likely would you be to vote for Sarah Palin if she turned out to be 70% likely to be a sociopath?
Much less.