A moral dilemma

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Jon Miller


But there is definitely a huge difference in opportunities, for people of equal ability.

Agreed in that some people, generally the more wealthy, will almost always have more resources to assist.

But even if you equalized wealth, some students would have more supportive parents than others. Some parents would spend every penney needed to help their children while others would just buy more toys.

I think it is impossible to completely equalize the opportunity for people and it is ridiculous to think you can.

The best we will ever manage is a reasonable level of opportunity.

[Flubber]

Back to the OP

I have no problem with private individuals and groups choosing to help whomever they wish. I don't mind hockey fans giving a scholarship to an athlete. I don't mind towns supporting their residents and I don't mind ethnic groups supporting their members.

I also don't have a huge problem with AA programs to help a perceived disadvantaged group. I do think that some programs are designed poorly though.

When I was in law school there was an IBM program for for both black and aboriginal students. While some of the students did great, some of the others really struggled as they lacked the fundamental academic ability. I thought that this AA program was somewhat misdirected at the law school level and that more resources should have gone into better schooling earlier . . . but law school was highly visible and political given the low number of minority lawyers in the province so admission to law school had minority quotas ( Interestingly though, any of the two minorities that were accepted outside the program ie in the regular admission process . .. were STRONGLY encouraged to join the program-- It was a back-asswards attempt to make their numbers look better)

[Kuciwalker]

Kuci, your analysis would be immensely more interesting, and you would look much less as a self-righteous spawn of the overclass, if you wondered about the extent to which inherited traits affect one's social success.

I don't do that because I don't have the ability to even begin to determine the extent. All I know is that experiments have shown that IQ is roughly 50% inheritable, that IQ is a decent measure of general itnelligence, and that general intelligence is a significant component of job performance. How much each of those dilutes the whole, I don't know.

btw, I'm not terribly concerned with how my arguments are perceived, unless you discount them because of the source, in which case I will happily point out that you are being an idiot, like fakeboris

If anyone wants to point out some genuine flaws in my analysis, go ahead.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Flubber
But even if you equalized wealth, some students would have more supportive parents than others. Some parents would spend every penney needed to help their children while others would just buy more toys.

It's not money, it's culture and upbringing. Parents with higher education place a greater emphasis on higher education.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


It's not money, it's culture and upbringing. Parents with higher education place a greater emphasis on higher education.

THats sorta my point although a family with oodles and oodles of money could still spend a lot on tutors and other help even if they didn't emphasize education

[Kuciwalker]

Returning to affirmative action: what if there is a selection bias in the immigrants of various ethnic groups? For instance, there's some ground to the stereotypes given Asians, IIRC; Asian immigrants disproportionately have undergraduate or graduate degrees. We essentially skim off many developing countries' "overclasses". Isn't it possible that no amount of affirmative action will erase the racial disparity here?

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


It's not money, it's culture and upbringing. Parents with higher education place a greater emphasis on higher education.

What if that culture is inheritable? That is, what if some caste considered it a caste duty to be as educated as possible? What if they preserved this culture even when impoverished, leading to a maintenance of the high value placed on learning even when they could not afford it, and leading to them considering it a first priority when they could?

How would that skew the scenario?

[Kuciwalker]

We don't have your primitive and inefficient caste system here, thankfully.

[Kuciwalker]

India has such a long history without equality of opportunity that it should be obvious that there's no genetic difference between castes, and bringing people from the lower castes into the higher education system will vastly increase the talent pool.

[Kuciwalker]

btw, the cultural aspect really only works across a generation or two. People tend to adopt attitudes consistent with their socioeconomic status.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
We don't have your primitive and inefficient caste system here, thankfully.

Nice troll, Kuci. I almost fell for it.

But more seriously - imagine that instead of caste, we have race. Imagine some immensely popular and respected leader of minority race FOO placed an insanely high value on education and learning. Now imagine that within roughly a generation, this value was propagated throughout the general population. The people of race FOO start viewing it almost as a racial duty to get as much education as they could.

How would this affect the scenario three or six generations down the line? Five hundred years down the line (assuming that the value is preserved)?

[Kuciwalker]

Only in a fundamentally racist society can the idea of "racial duty" exist.

[DAVOUT]

error

[DAVOUT]

Spiffor

Interesting …

Take the study carried out by Thomas Hertz, an economist at American University in Washington, DC, who studied a representative sample of 6,273 American families (both black and white) over 32 years or two generations. He found that 42% of those born into the poorest fifth ended up where they started?at the bottom. Another 24% moved up slightly to the next-to-bottom group. Only 6% made it to the top fifth. Upward mobility was particularly low for black families. On the other hand, 37% of those born into the top fifth remained there, whereas barely 7% of those born into the top 20% ended up in the bottom fifth. A person born into the top fifth is over five times as likely to end up at the top as a person born into the bottom fifth.

… but

The rationale is a bit strange
If 42% of those born into the poorest fifth ended up where they started, am I wrong to think that 58% have moved up, which is not so bad. Would you think desirable that 100% of those born in the poorest fifth ended up higher after 32 years?

But this analysis is built on the total population divided in five equal parts: anytime one member of the poorest fifth moved up, a member of one of the other three parts has to move down. And, as it is more difficult to move in the second fifth that in the third, and to the first than in the second, only 6% reach the top in 32 years. The assumption that it is easier to stay in the top when you are in that to move in is an obviousness; nevertheless some are not good enough to keep their chair and fall down to the bottom; that does not mean that it is easy to stay in, but that the same number are unable to stay that the number that are able to move in.

Who wants a society redistributing everything every 32 years?

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
India has such a long history without equality of opportunity that it should be obvious that there's no genetic difference between castes, and bringing people from the lower castes into the higher education system will vastly increase the talent pool.

Nobody is denying that. Nor am I saying that there is a statistically significant difference of intelligence between the castes in India.

What you're not realising is that this "bringing" has already been done - there already exists a 50% flat quota. But to the great dismay of the proponents of the quota, it has not resulted in any significant difference in the break-up of people getting in through the open category - that is, on merit.






However, I am saying that a sense of caste culture led to people from certain caste groups valuing education even when they could not afford it, and leading to even the most impoverished of those from the said groups clutching at each and every opportunity, howsoever slender, of obtaining it. How would the existence of such a culture associated with caste (or any inherited characteristic - such as race) skew the results?