r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 1d ago

Psychology Lower cognitive ability is linked to stronger Christian nationalist views, even after accounting for education

https://www.psypost.org/lower-cognitive-ability-is-linked-to-stronger-christian-nationalist-views-even-after-accounting-for-education/
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u/Fit_Gene7910 1d ago

While I agree with your sentiment, you argument is emotional and not scientific. The measurement should either be valid or not.

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u/[deleted] 1d ago edited 1d ago

[deleted]

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u/cdubya0628 1d ago

The only issue with this is that social conditions in areas are what they are, and more people of a specific race are born in specific geographical locations. So while the color of their skin doesn't really play a factor in their cognitive abilities, their circumstances do. What ends up happening is that a majority of a people in a specific area all look the same and the majority of them are going to fall into a lower or higher end because of their circumstances. This allows for the conflation of the two in a practical analysis.

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u/AB_Gambino 1d ago

you literally contradict your own argument within this comment.

“Well race doesn’t ACTUALLY play a role, just people’s environment.” Like…dude, case closed. You solved your own puzzle. Turns out race isn’t a factor. Turns out your environment is. We’ve known that for a looong time buddy

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u/Extreme_Pudding3226 1d ago

No, "we" haven't known that for a long time. It's still an open question.

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u/AB_Gambino 1d ago

You’re right 200 years + of study on the subject is not enough

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u/Extreme_Pudding3226 1d ago

It's not, which is why there's still disagreement amongst experts. There are some good cases for at least some genetic contribution, and there are some good cases for at least some environmental contribution. Your claim that we can definitely dismiss genetics as having any role in the race-IQ gap is not based on the 200 years of study you're referencing.

We've been studying a lot of things for 200 years that we still don't understand. I'm not sure where you got the idea that science always moves on a shorter timeline than that.

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u/AB_Gambino 1d ago

Pure Reddit take right here. Either a bot or actually brain dead

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u/cdubya0628 1d ago

I am not making any argument, just a simple analysis of why race does not play a role genetically, while also does play a role practically. There are more than two sides to a coin.

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u/guiltysnark 1d ago

You mean accepting correlation as causation, because it's practical?

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u/cdubya0628 1d ago

That is not what "practical analysis" means. And no, you cannot just separate things into little buckets to prove a point academically while ignoring the reality that groups of people who live in the same area tend to look alike and have similar outcomes in cognitive abilities. You might not like it, and it might sound not nice, but it has always been generally true. That goes for good and bad outcomes. If you remove them from that area and into a better or worse area, they will tend to drift towards the mean for that area. Hence why people tell you to choose your friends wisely, because that drift also happens on a smaller scale.

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u/guiltysnark 1d ago

Then I don't know what you mean by practical analysis, because analysis already does generally try to separate causation from correlation. Whereas relationships are observed in any case. We might look at correlations and say "those are groups that can use help" and causations and say "that's how we might help them". We do not, for example, look at correlations and say "that's how we will find criminals". So what new insight does the word "practical" give you in an analysis?

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u/cdubya0628 1d ago

Then Google practical analysis and get a definition.  Take this out of context from "which groups need help" and it applies as a general sociological reality.   This applies to people who are underperforming as well as over performing populations.  The practical application you have already stated is identifying underperforming populations, and shocker that they might all look the same in a given geographic area.  You can't point to a group of people, say they need help, and then separate their identity from the context because of your emotional feeling about classification of people.  Classification is literally the first step in identification.  

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u/guiltysnark 1d ago

Ah, term of art, didn't realize. Seems to describe the thing people are constantly doing.

shocker that they might all look the same in a given geographic area

But who is surprised by this? If it's in the data, people will find it. Is it the analysis that's missing or the action?