This is why I don't believe in a benevolent, omnipotent god (except maybe a posthuman universe simulation):
Apparently this guy believes that yes, Watson has a point. However, he makes a point that:
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"In terms of natural endowment, Africa ought to be the richest of the continents but see the mess we have made of the potential for greatness which God in his infinite wisdom has bestowed upon us."
"As I write this, I do so with great pains in my heart because I know that God has given intelligence in equal measure to all his children irrespective of the colour of their skin. The problem with us black people is that we have refused to use our intelligence to organise ourselves socially and politically."
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That's just not true. Brain size has a .4 correlation with intelligence, beyond a doubt, and it's also proven, beyond a doubt, that Africans have smaller brains. That's a problem that is attributable to biology, not discrimination.
The ONLY rationale for denying HBD comes from believing in creationism. Because think about it. If someone believes that the human race emerged from natural selection, then the selection didn't magically turn off 150,000 years ago when humans left east africa. It continued.
From wikipedia's entry
"In the late 20th century United States, unequal reproductive rates favoring the less intelligent would have lowered the IQ of the population by anywhere between 0.35 and 0.8 points per generation had the environment remained unchanged over time. In order to create an IQ difference of 15 points between two populations in 100,000 years, natural selection would have to drive their IQs apart by only 0.004 points every generation – about 1% of the selective pressure in late 20th-century America. [135] Meisenberg argues that measurements of genetic diversity by the population geneticist Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza indicate that the difference in “genotypic” intelligence between the most divergent human populations caused by random genetic drift should be about 12 IQ points.[136]"
Can you imagine what non random drift would have done? Like the selection pressures of an ice age or technology? Or disease? Or sexual selection?
So yeah, this is why I don't feel comfortable with either conservatives or liberals. Religious conservatives can't admit the role of evolution in creating human differences, while the liberals can't admit the possibility of evolution to create human biological differences. Both sides like to deny science when it's convenient for them.
Anyway, why would God create a race with an average IQ or 70, which basically prevents the majority of them from truly understanding God? How the hell can they really understand what it means to say" Jesus is my savior" if they have the mental age of a 10 year old? Can't happen. A 10 year old saying it has no idea what he's saying unless he's pretty bright.
It's a tough world out there. Liberals isolate themselves in their ivory towers and suburban bubbles, so they allow themselves to get deluded with visions of equality instead of of confronting the truth, because they don't have to suffer from their delusions. I consistenly find myself feeling guilty for my racial attitudes even though I know they are right.
To be truly compassionate and to truly understand the suffering of Africa and blacks is to acknowledge racial differences and make realistic policies. Building a well in a village, setting up a microfinance fund, or donating 10,000 mosquito nets WILL NOT CUT IT.
To an atheist, we just have this world. That's it. We have to make it the best, most just, and fairest world possible for everyone. Because when we die, that's it. So why not make the earth a better place? Why not give up your ideology and look hard at truths in order to really make a difference?
You World Bank people know what's up. Why don't you put your taboo ideas into practise instead of living in lavish hotels and preaching privatization with no regard for human ability? You like to think that you are great people because you're working to solve the problem of world poverty.
I'm sure it sounds great to starry eyed liberal co-eds when you tell them about the "passion" and "idealism" in the young africans you meet on trips.
You are truly scum if, knowing that your ideas will fail and that kid who'se smiling today could be dead from malaria in a year, CONTINUE to justify your fat expat salaries with standard economic theory with lots of formulas.
Wake up people. Life isn't all about fitting in, being liked, and having the best car or fanciest myspace page or the most amount of wall postings on facebook.
Do something with your god damn life.
9 comments:
Anyway, why would God create a race with an average IQ or 70, which basically prevents the majority of them from truly understanding God? How the hell can they really understand what it means to say" Jesus is my savior" if they have the mental age of a 10 year old? Can't happen. A 10 year old saying it has no idea what he's saying unless he's pretty bright.
I don't believe that the ability to feel basic emotions is related to intelligence. And that's all you really need to be a Christian. Even if you were mentally retarded, you could still understand the basic concept of the Gospel because you don't really have to do any thinking. I think that children in general tend to lack a sense of guilt, as they may feel ashamed when they commit sin, but they don't, in my opinion, generally feel guilt. But I see no reason to believe adults of low intelligence are the same way. I think the practice of speaking of mental ages is a bad idea in general since the brain does not simply grow linearly and uniformly each year; a child's brain isn't just a miniature adult's brain. Africans with IQs in the 70s are just as well developed, emotionally, as adults Caucasoids with IQs in the 100s but children generally are not.
I know that wasn't your main point, though. Your main point is that there is no God. I don't see why you keep trying to tie human inequalities to atheism as if God's existence depends on his taking action against injustices in our present world. That doesnt prove there is no benevlent God, it just proves God doesnt give us instant gratification of our desires, even when they are good-hearted desires. God never said he would turn the world into Heaven.
I would like to invite you here once again.
I just want to point out to any Christians reading here that I'm an ex-Christian and I no longer believe in the Bible, but I do still strongly believe in a benevolent God, and sometimes I have trouble expressing my beliefs without falling back on Christian doctrine that I remember from my teenage years.
It was a commonly held belief in ancient times in most religions that those who do good will prosper not just in Heaven but down here on Earth. Even the book of Job, which starts off showing God acting about as cruel as any god could be, has a happy ending where Job, because he was faithful to God through all his hardships, ends up becoming even richer than before and lives 140 years and has lots of children to replace his dead ones. But we know it doesn't happen that way in real life. Job is a fairytale written and repeated by the ancient Hebrews to make themselves feel better about how unfair life seemed to be. Maybe in those days life was rough and people needed stories like that to soothe themselves. You and I can both agree that that is a bad mindset to carry in the world we live in today. And I think that people, Christian and otherwise, have indeed matured beyond the expectation that doing good deeds will always, or even often, lead to prosperity in this world as opposed to in the afterlife. So I think you're attacking a straw man by equating the existence of human inequality with the nonexistence of a benevolent God; every major religion nowadays accepts that life is unfair and that doing God's will isn't going to fix that.
Look, I'm not talking in terms of the problem of evil or why bad things happen to good people. That's been beaten to death.
What I am saying here, is that a belief in God is the ONLY thing that can truly ultimately allow one to make claims that all races are the same deep down. Because if one believes in natural selection, then they have to accept the evolution of humans after the emergence of homo sapien.
Anyway, have you met someone with an IQ of 70? Do you think they understand anything a pastor is saying at a church?
The ideas from the bible that you refer to work well for individuals, but not groups. Think about it. Whenever someone tries to raise ALL of humanity above animals, there has to be some sort of theological basis.
And honestly, I really think that alot of human conflict and suffering is due to either religion OR race differences. If God was perfect, what possible reason would he have to create such a world?
My answer? God may exist, but in the form of a posthuman simulating this universe on a computer. That God is not perfect nor benevolent, and the creation of race differences in intelligence may still be entertaining to him, especially after reading about it in the popular press.
Growing up, I was able to reconcile my faith with poverty, terrorism, and environmental destruction. But for some reason that apparently I am yet to fairly articulate, my faith did not survive the assault of race differences in intelligence.
The sadness I had after 9/11 and seeing poverty in India was nothing compared to the depression I had after reading R. Lynn's "Race differences in intelligence". And really questioning who the hell I was praying to that would do such a thing to the human race.
It's unfortunate for Christians that they tend to be associated with Creationism, because that ruins the credibility of Christianity for a lot of science-minded people. Now what you are saying is that only a belief in God can make a person deny science enough to deny HBD differences as well. Fair enough, but I'd have said Creationism myself, not belief in God plain and simple. Otherwise you're just alienating Christians and other theists who might otherwise be close allies of yours.
I dont know the IQs of everyone I meet, but I would say that Down Syndrome people are mostly under 70 and there do exist prayer groups for them.
I see your point. I'm not only out to convince the world of this HDB stuff, because I don't even know how people will react to it.
I put atheism on a higher pedestal than race differences. If Christians are alienated, so be it. I don't agree with everything Steve Sailer or the NYT editorial board, but I find both interesting to read.
All beliefs should be subject to rigorous questioning, not just race, but faith as well. Again, we rarely see anyone who is willing to challenge the majority on both because most everyone has some sacred beliefs they don't want to question.
"Anyway, why would God create a race with an average IQ or 70, which basically prevents the majority of them from truly understanding God? How the hell can they really understand what it means to say" Jesus is my savior" if they have the mental age of a 10 year old? Can't happen. A 10 year old saying it has no idea what he's saying unless he's pretty bright. "
Ah, so africans are too stupid to even understand god's love. I wonder if he'd show any love to someone as hideously misanthropic as you?
Yeah, I've been reading your comments. You apparently seem so torn by racialism, and seemed to have been hit with it early this year. Maybe late 06. It hit me in mid 06.
Yet, I didn't follow your path. I've found just as much substantiation for what I believed before, though without the environmentalism. I wonder what you're doing wrong?
Well damn. You really do seem to be in a tough position. Really, I feel sorry for you. Do you have some kind of instant messaging service? I think I can help.
? It's not that bad. Life is interesting.
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