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posted by chromas on Sunday January 13 2019, @10:00PM   Printer-friendly
from the race-to-disgrace dept.

James Watson: Scientist loses titles after claims over race

Nobel Prize-winning American scientist James Watson has been stripped of his honorary titles after repeating comments about race and intelligence.

In a TV programme, the pioneer in DNA studies made a reference to a view that genes cause a difference on average between blacks and whites on IQ tests. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory said the 90-year-old scientist's remarks were "unsubstantiated and reckless". Dr Watson had made similar claims in 2007 and subsequently apologised.

He shared the Nobel in 1962 with Maurice Wilkins and Francis Crick for their 1953 discovery of the DNA's double helix structure.

Dr Watson sold his gold medal in 2014, saying he had been ostracised by the scientific community after his remarks about race. He is currently in a nursing home recovering from a car accident and is said to have "very minimal" awareness of his surroundings.

Previously: Disgraced Scientist is Selling his Nobel Prize


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  • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @10:31PM (39 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @10:31PM (#786065)

    saying that intelligence is a racial thing is not supported by evidence. Here is the salient point you racist twits never seem to retain:

    There is more variation within a single racial group than can be found between two different groups.

    The IQ statistics show a median average, they say nothing about individuals. If African Americans make up 12% of the population and commit around 50% of crime, we can do some estimates. Crime is disproportionately committed by young (6%) males (3%). So 3% of the US population commits 50% of the crime. How exactly do you propose we solve that problem if we're not even allowed to discuss it or the correlation between poor impulse control and low IQ? [sciencedirect.com]

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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by HiThere on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:23PM (36 children)

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:23PM (#786104) Journal

    What about if you find that poor people are convicted of most of the crimes, and a disproportionately large percentage of the poor people are black?

    Environment has a very complex relation to genetics in final behavior.

    P.S.: Lead poisoning, and various other poisonings, are known to be associated with both being poor and having a low IQ. It's not just genetics.

    --
    Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:34PM (17 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:34PM (#786114)

      Finally a voice of reason. The racists around here need to learn that these systems are intertwined and complex, and worrying about which race is "better" is a stupid waste of time and energy that is objectively wrong.

      • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:41PM (16 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:41PM (#786116)

        Finally a voice of reason. The racists around here need to learn that these systems are intertwined and complex, and worrying about which race is "better" is a stupid waste of time and energy that is objectively wrong.

        Discrimination (like affirmative action) is racist, looking for solutions to evident underlying problems is not. The left [politifact.com] has now lost the fucking plot [psychologytoday.com]

        • (Score: 0, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:56AM (15 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:56AM (#786213)

          Hey this is policy now you can't object to it
          The next person hired cannot be white. Must be black or minority.
          Must be male. Must be female.
          Diversity is king!

          • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @02:00AM (14 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @02:00AM (#786216)

            That was the 8th movie with a white or Asian lead. The next movie must have a black lead.

            Okay but we already have script and funding and author approval and distribution and

            The lead must be black

            But the character isn't black in the source material

            Change it

            People will notice

            Just do it

            What about the fans

            If they complain they are racist

            Its your money.

            • (Score: 2) by Kell on Monday January 14 2019, @05:22AM (13 children)

              by Kell (292) on Monday January 14 2019, @05:22AM (#786284)

              Except, historically, this seems to go the other way? I can only think of one counter example, where Dr. Martin King jr was being played by a caucasian man. It made made headlines, and always struck me as ironic as King had not wanted people to be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the quality of their character.

              --
              Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:25AM (12 children)

                by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:25AM (#786357)

                It made made headlines, and always struck me as ironic as King had not wanted people to be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the quality of their character.

                Unfortunately there are many who assert that being "colorblind" is a form of racial discrimination, and who strongly support being judged by skin color when it results in their being given preferential treatment.

                One such example of this is affirmative action.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:43AM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:43AM (#786363)

                  Hey I know one of them! Talking with her is life being in room 101.
                  Up is up so long as she agrees it is up. According to her hiring a less qualified minority is better than a more qualified person who is not a minority.
                  In a strange weird turnaround from what it looks like it seems that asians are treated as Caucasian around here now. This might very well be a local abnormality. One I know was pissed that a "minority" got the job she applied for in two applicants on the back of her 15+ years experience over the two years of the other. Watching her boil at the morning tea thrown for the new minority manager I considered how this hire could be called a minority when there are a billion of them on the planet. Just must be a new age terminology twist.

                • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Kell on Monday January 14 2019, @10:10AM (7 children)

                  by Kell (292) on Monday January 14 2019, @10:10AM (#786393)

                  I am personally dead-set against quotas and affirmative action. Nothing pisses me off more than someone assuming that I got a job or promotion "just because" I'm a woman. It harms companies by choosing weaker candidates, and it harms candidates by casting aspersions on their merit.

                  --
                  Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:33PM (1 child)

                    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:33PM (#786429)

                    Management have been trumpeting that we now have over 55% females in leadership positions across the organization. That's Middlelevel management and higher.

                    You should see some of these managers in action. It's disgraceful. Aweful.

                    A long time ago we had strong, strategic, inspiring female managers. Less than 10% of management. In some ways it sucked to be them. They had to be everything a male manager was and more. Watching them, learning from them, working with them was inspiring.

                    Now we have people who can pass an MBA, maybe.

                    Hey, though. We have more than half the management positions filled by females. And that is what counts.

                    I miss the old days.

                    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:36PM

                      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:36PM (#786708)

                      And that is what counts.

                      Especially for the competition!

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @06:40PM

                    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @06:40PM (#786548)

                    can someone explain why this was voted down?

                    i would like that everyone with talent is recognized and rewarded, without the need for an arbitrary playing field leveling system. that she expresses concern that people expect she's not talented and instead is part of an effort to level the playing field because of a quota, that doesn't seem trollish, but maybe im missing the context.

                  • (Score: 2) by Kell on Tuesday January 15 2019, @12:07AM (2 children)

                    by Kell (292) on Tuesday January 15 2019, @12:07AM (#786719)

                    How the hell is this modded as a troll? This is something I've experienced first hand as a "diversity candidate".

                    --
                    Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
                    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @02:23AM

                      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @02:23AM (#786749)

                      It doesn't fit the SJW agenda?

                    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @05:37AM

                      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @05:37AM (#786797)

                      Rule 16: There are no women on the internet.

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @10:12PM

                    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @10:12PM (#787075)

                    https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-trial-to-improve-gender-equality-failing-study/8664888?pfmredir=sm [abc.net.au]

                    have a read of this article, it's a real cack
                    they put ina policy to remove discrimination against women when hiring in the public service only to find that people generally discriminated *for* female candidates

                • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday January 15 2019, @06:30AM (2 children)

                  by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday January 15 2019, @06:30AM (#786821) Journal

                  That's an oversimplification. "Colorblind" is a problem because it assumes a level playing field where there isn't one. Now, the answer may not be "reverse discrimination," but unless and until something is done to fix the underlying causes, what else is left? I have a friend who compares AA to aspirin for a cancer patient, but also opines "if it's aspirin or nothing I'd of course want the aspirin."

                  --
                  I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @09:13AM (1 child)

                    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @09:13AM (#786842)

                    That's an oversimplification. "Colorblind" is a problem because it assumes a level playing field where there isn't one. Now, the answer may not be "reverse discrimination," but unless and until something is done to fix the underlying causes, what else is left? I have a friend who compares AA to aspirin for a cancer patient, but also opines "if it's aspirin or nothing I'd of course want the aspirin."

                    Interesting perspective, but what is the criteria to satisfy the conditions that a "level playing field" has been achieved? Such that affirmative action -- just another form of racial discrimination -- can be tossed aside completely?

                    • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday January 15 2019, @06:57PM

                      by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday January 15 2019, @06:57PM (#787001) Journal

                      Yes. If we truly have equality of opportunity, we wouldn't need AA. I don't like it personally, but the only alternative in the present system--getting rid of it and replacing it with jack shit--is even worse.

                      --
                      I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:36PM (17 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 13 2019, @11:36PM (#786115)

      Yes, all completely true. Given we're talking about IQ being inheritable, why are the parents poor? What can we do in terms of nutrition (also a factor in IQ) to help?

      The problem is that the left (generally) don't want a solution, they want to pretend the problem doesn't exist. They disgust me. [miamiherald.com]

      • (Score: 1, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:22AM (12 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @01:22AM (#786183)

        What can we do in terms of nutrition (also a factor in IQ) to help?

        Socialist programs such as food stamps will help. Something like a UBI would be wonderful, because that could address the financial stress of the whole family (factors beyond nutrition). We must also replace lead pipes that may leech into potable water lines.

        • (Score: 0, Troll) by Sulla on Monday January 14 2019, @05:18AM (11 children)

          by Sulla (5173) on Monday January 14 2019, @05:18AM (#786281) Journal

          We have talked about this on soylent several times recently with results from different countries. The Norway and Denmark trials both found that it reduced peoples desire to seek out work, instead deciding to make due with what they have. There were studies done by universities in the States in the 70s and 80s that showed the same thing. A problem our society already has is people being able to vote for their own wages, additional forms of welfare are not going to help. Bread and circus' are good for keeping people fat and happy, but they do little so soothe the soul or advance the species. There are some among us (I imagine the vast majority of soylentels) who would see the UBI as a great extra bit of money and keep working and providing for continued society, but I presume we also tend to be smarter than the average person.

          I am all for short term safety nets, but I am not going to pay for someone to do nothing when they are perfectly able to do something. WIC is nice for helping families out and helping with good child development and nutrition, food stamps are nice for making sure someone doesn't starve between jobs, unemployment insurance is good for making sure a family doesn't lose their house because they lost their jobs, but only for short periods of time.

          --
          Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
          • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Kell on Monday January 14 2019, @05:51AM (6 children)

            by Kell (292) on Monday January 14 2019, @05:51AM (#786297)

            I don't see UBI as a panacea for getting people into work. I rather see it as a solution to future social strife caused by automation. Consider this: as companies replace workers with automation, the costs of goods will decline, but so too will workers' ability to pay for them. The low cost of goods is meaningless if you have no money at all. This is further exacerbated when real estate cartel behaviour locks low-earners out of owning property. If your workers cannot gain employment because they are incapable of being retrained (either from being too poor or too old), then that person is basically cut out of the market for labour and thus have no way to support themselves. They cannot afford land, and thus cannot even subsistence farm. Desperate unemployed people - especially young ones - are a perfect formula for social strife.

            The wealthy have their needs met by automated services and high-income technical professionals who can still demand a livable wage; they have no need or motivation to share the massive productivity of automated factories with people outside of the economic system. As a society, we have a choice: we can either share our productivity with people who cannot (and who maybe never will) contribute economically, or else let them starve/riot/etc until they die out. Just as with people too sick or injured to work, we use tax money to provide welfare to give them a means to live. A form of governmental charity. So too, when automation eventually renders people unable to work we will be obliged to provide for them. Hand-wringing moralising how "if we don't make them work, they'll be lazy" is puritan nonsense that only values someone because of their utility. We should help people not because they 'earned it', but because to do otherwise is monstrous. Otherwise, we are tacitly accepting that their own humanity is by itself no merit to live.

            So, to me UBI is more about providing a means for non-wealthy people to be supported and have a fraction of the industrial output of society. An alternative approach, if you prefer, is to require that some minimum fraction of all corporations be publically owned and that fraction of productivity or dividends be used to support the population. There is no argument I can think of that can justify why, in an age of almost limitless production capacity, only a handful of humans should benefit at the expense of the rest of mankind.

            --
            Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
            • (Score: 1) by Sulla on Monday January 14 2019, @06:42AM (3 children)

              by Sulla (5173) on Monday January 14 2019, @06:42AM (#786321) Journal

              Who automation thing is pretty terrible. In around a decade some 30 million truck drivers are going to need new jobs.

              Me I'm trying to buy land so at least my kids can be dirt farmers.

              --
              Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
              • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday January 14 2019, @07:13AM (2 children)

                by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 14 2019, @07:13AM (#786332) Journal

                Me I'm trying to buy land so at least my kids can be dirt farmers.

                "Fucking you, got mine" at the wannabe stage.
                Good luck, eminent domain laws are there to make sure those who can pay more for that patch of dirt will get it.

                --
                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                • (Score: 2) by Oakenshield on Monday January 14 2019, @03:26PM

                  by Oakenshield (4900) on Monday January 14 2019, @03:26PM (#786452)

                  "Fucking you, got mine" at the wannabe stage.

                  The way I see it, OP is allocating his resources based upon long term needs as opposed to short term gain. Your vitriol is unwarranted. Would you be happier if he had said, "fuck the future, I'm buying a new iPhone" instead?

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @04:04PM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @04:04PM (#786466)

                  I always felt that using eminent domain for private sector things was a HUGE mistake. That precedent should have never been made.

                  I understand that the government must sometimes have a specific plot of land for a public works projects (discontinuities in roads are not great), but unless the land will become public, eminent domain should not be allowed to be invoked.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:43PM (1 child)

              by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:43PM (#786711)

              What is the way out of a UBI if it doesn't work as advertised. As is the fate of so many good intentioned programs?

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @02:08AM

                by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 15 2019, @02:08AM (#786742)

                Are you suggesting that if people are given free money they will adjust their lifestyle to the lowest income bracket and never search for work or have a job and be on holiday for the rest of their lives just sitting at home watching Netflix or camping forever?

                Nooooooooo

                say it ain't so

                surely humanity is better than that

          • (Score: 4, Insightful) by sjames on Monday January 14 2019, @09:04AM (3 children)

            by sjames (2882) on Monday January 14 2019, @09:04AM (#786370) Journal

            The Norway and Denmark trials both found that it reduced peoples desire to seek out work, instead deciding to make due with what they have.

            That sounds suspiciously like code for "people will only put up with so much shit unless they have no choice.

            Let's face it, hold a gun to someone's head and many will clean the bathroom floor with their tongue. If instead you offer them an extra serving of ice cream after dinner they'll tell you to fuck off.

            That doesn't make holding them at gunpoint the better option for society.

            • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @03:36PM (2 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @03:36PM (#786455)

              That sounds suspiciously like code for "people will only put up with so much shit unless they have no choice.

              Let's face it, hold a gun to someone's head and many will clean the bathroom floor with their tongue. If instead you offer them an extra serving of ice cream after dinner they'll tell you to fuck off.

              That doesn't make holding them at gunpoint the better option for society.

              Instead you would rather hold someone else at gunpoint to take their money and pay for that "free lunch". Why should I be obligated to support someone who refuses to make any effort to support himself?

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:15PM

                by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @08:15PM (#786601)

                Seeing as how those same people would have no qualms about using those guns to prevent me growing my own food and building my own shelter the "wrong" way, yes, I have no problem taking some of their extra money to support others. And at this point in time, I'd be one of those whose money they'd be taking to support UBI.

              • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Wednesday January 16 2019, @11:32PM

                by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday January 16 2019, @11:32PM (#787653) Homepage Journal

                While talking about the government holding you at gunpoint, consider that the poor, once they become a large enough group, may well commit a somewhat chaotic armed rebellion, and the results of that will likely be as unpredictable as the outcomes of other revolutions, such as the Russian revolution now and the French revolution earlier. You may be one of many to die instead of merely having a predictable amount of takes taken away.

      • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Bogsnoticus on Monday January 14 2019, @01:56AM (3 children)

        by Bogsnoticus (3982) on Monday January 14 2019, @01:56AM (#786211)

        Given that it is the right wing of politics who fight tooth and nail against paying employees a wage they can live off without having to resort to a second (and possibly third) job, food stamps, charities or crowd-funding, you should be aiming your disgust in the opposite direction.
        The "left" does not pretend the problem does not exist, they don't want the problem to exist in the first place.

        --
        Genius by birth. Evil by choice.
        • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @02:09AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @02:09AM (#786219)

          Given that it is the right wing of politics

          The right are responsible for this? [youtube.com] In the most progressive state in the union with one of the lowest IQ scores? [inc.com] Why is that? [lasentinel.net]

          Basically, fuck you! Homeless black people living in abject poverty in the richest state is courtesy of the left. Own it!

        • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Sulla on Monday January 14 2019, @05:20AM (1 child)

          by Sulla (5173) on Monday January 14 2019, @05:20AM (#786283) Journal

          Without immigration the birth rate in this country would be flat, yet the economy is growing. This would force employers to compete harder for the average employee, which would be increases in benefits and pay. Instead the Democrats flood us with low-skilled labor so the people who are already hurting just keep hurting, and the Republicans flood us with H1B that out-compete debt ridden students who were tricked into getting student loans.

          The left pretends immigration doesn't hurt us, the right pretends that corporations can't find workers.

          --
          Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:48PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @11:48PM (#786715)

            It takes two people to be tricked.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @05:06AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @05:06AM (#786275)

    "If African Americans make up 12% of the population and commit around 50% of crime, we can do some estimates. "

    Indeed, we can estimate between 35-63% of cops are biased racist fuckwads. Remember there's plenty of evidence showing that black people get locked up for things a white person wouldn't even get a warning for.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @05:34AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 14 2019, @05:34AM (#786290)

      The FBI has evidence for the numbers that you are complaining about, what evidence do you have for the numbers you are refuting it with? The cops that I have interacted with that grew up on the west coast or in a small town are entirely different officers than the ones that grew up in big crime ridden cities.

      We cannot dismiss that excessive racism could be a cause, we also cannot dismiss that we are different people. The same medicine will work different based on the color of your skin because of the differences in the genes that cause it. We need to understand our differences to find the best ways to make everything level out.

      http://www.governing.com/gov-data/safety-justice/police-department-officer-demographics-minority-representation.html [governing.com]
      You can select a police department here and see what their ethnic breakdown is. If you were correct than the number of black folks arrested would go down with the number of black officers, but this does not appear to be the case when you look at major cities.