Dysgenics: Is the western society gene pool degenerating?

[Geronimo]

While I wish discussion of the topic was not taboo there is currently nothing I would want to see actually done about the problem.

I abhor all of the possible "solutions" or remedies that might be contemplated for immediate implementation.

We have the luxury of waiting because even the most pessimistic predictions would seem to require decades to significantly erode the capabilities of civilization as a whole.

Instead I am hopeful that eventually we will have such a thorough understanding of the brain, intelligence, and the genetics behind it that we will be able to very carefully use advanced gene therapy techniques to gradually reverse the decline. Even then I'd prefer tight regulation of such an approach so that it it can't easily devolve into reckless effort on the part of parents to make their children all super intelligent. The entire human population having identical genotypes with respect to all genes found to have a positive correlation with g would probably be bad in more ways than could be easily determined.

On the other hand I know from experience that a lot of people would rebel even against the notion of such modest "tinkering". To those people I assume it would take a clear and irrefutable observed decline in the overall intelligence of the population before any sort of agreement on such action could be reached.

All the more reason to wait the problem out.

Calm rational discussion of issues relating to eugenics

Current options to achieve eugenic goals:

Informed tinkering with the human genetic code in the future:

[Kidlicious]

I don't think the fact that there aren't enough smart people is a cause of the problems in society. ****, a lot of smart people are the cause.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Kidicious
I don't think the fact that there aren't enough smart people is a cause of the problems in society. ****, a lot of smart people are the cause.

sounds like a troll. But in any case I believe that in the absence of a sufficient pool of intelligence technological progress will halt and I am a technophile.

I also cringe at the thought of trying to maintain democracy with even less intelligence in the population than what we have now.

[Caligastia]

The poor can have as many kids as they want as long as they don't ask me to pay for them.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Geronimo
sounds like a troll. But in any case I believe that in the absence of a sufficient pool of intelligence technological progress will halt and I am a technophile.

I gathered that much. I don't think technological progress will halt though. That's seems like a bit of paranoia, but maybe you chose bad wording. I'm not a technophile though. If you want to argue just for technological advancement I don't disagree with you, but progress means more than that to me. I think we get caught up believing that technology is progress and we get distracted from true progess.

I also cringe at the thought of trying to maintain democracy with even less intelligence in the population than what we have now.

I don't think that intelligent people make better voters. Intelligent people seem to have even more ****ed up view points than stupid people. That's not a troll. I hope that is pretty common sense.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Caligastia
The poor can have as many kids as they want as long as they don't ask me to pay for them.

What is your IQ?

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


can someone please tell me how a twin study adjusts for the impact of the prenatal environment? Arent twins both exposed to identical influences from maternal nutrition, alcohol use, etc? How would a correlation ofiIntelligence among twins distinguish the impact of such influences from the impact of genes?

The idea is that the difference between the intelligence of identical twins is less than the difference between non-identical ones. That pretty much nails the point.

[Solly]

Originally posted by Kidicious


My father has an extremely high IQ btw.

And here was me thinking intelligence could be hereditary.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris


The idea is that the difference between the intelligence of identical twins is less than the difference between non-identical ones. That pretty much nails the point.

identical twins and non-identical twins adopted into different families, it would have to be, otherwise the fact that parents may parent identical twins differently, and more like each other, than non-identical twins would come into play.

So someone had to find enough sets of identical and non-identical twins, adopted into different families, to get a statistically valid sample. Hmmmm.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Doddler


And here was me thinking intelligence could be hereditary.

You were suppose to be thinking that you get your intelligence from your maternal grandmother anyway.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris


The idea is that the difference between the intelligence of identical twins is less than the difference between non-identical ones. That pretty much nails the point.

-edit- nm LOTM made a better point

[Kidlicious]

I did a lot of reading on this this morning and I didn't come across anything regarding non-identical twins.

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by lord of the mark


identical twins and non-identical twins adopted into different families, it would have to be, otherwise the fact that parents may parent identical twins differently, and more like each other, than non-identical twins would come into play.

So someone had to find enough sets of identical and non-identical twins, adopted into different families, to get a statistically valid sample. Hmmmm.

What? if they are adopted in different families, then environmental similitude disappears.

also: the bottom line is that the correlation exists both in related individuals that shared the same upbringing and those who did not.

[lord of the mark]

Ger, Oncle Boris.

If you compare identical and non-identical twins who are in their birth families, you are ok on the prenatal stuff, cause non-id twins will ALSO be exposed to the same prenatal environ. If you compare identical twins who are adopted, to any random adopted kids, you adjust for the childhood environment, but NOT the prenatal environment.

To adjust for BOTH the prenatal and postnatal environments you would have to compare identical and non-id twins, each set of twins being adopted into different families, and then compare to see whether the identical twins are more alike than the non-identical twins. That certainly makes sense as a way of isolating the genetic factor. AFAICT its the only way.

[Kidlicious]

Supposidely they take a large enough sample to make up for environmental differences.