Interesting musings on IQ and the Wealth of Nations

[Heraclitus]

Not really. Especially since people haven't even taken to eugenics.

I means seriusly like the good Oliver Wendell Holmes said three generations of imbeciles like the lovley gal below is enough.




I don't get how people that ugly reproduce at all.

[Drake Tungsten]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcoholic_beverage

[Riesstiu IV]

[Hera]
"Ugh, why do ugly people, gypsies, and ******s have emotions and the need to reproduce? Can't they see I need to deny their basic rights so my superior Übermensch-Post Human-Cyborg offspring will be able to create the perfect Aryan society!"

*Dies childless after a lifetime of sperging on eugenics, IQ, transhumanism, and forced sterilization*
[/Hera]

[aneeshm]

@ Heraclitus:

I'd say that current policies have eugenic effects, just that those effects are not counted among their effects at all.

For instance, any policy which protects a parent from the consequences (responsibilities) of parenthood is one which naturally tends to provide an incentive for the unwise or incapable to have more children, as they know that these children will be supported by the state; on the other hand, absent this guarantee, these people would be far more careful to either use contraception, or abort a the fetus of a child they think they cannot support. Effectively, therefore, a large number of policies that have been instituted today actually do have eugenic (dysgenic) effects; the nature of these effects, however, would generally not be regarded as long-term desirable. These policies are familiar to all of us, and I do not need to mention each one in detail.

I do not think that explicit "eugenics", in the form of a state-sponsored subsidy of the reproductive preferences (or advantages) of some subset of the population, is either necessary or desirable; absent policies with negative and unconsidered side-effects such as the ones mentioned above (eugenic "externalities", so to speak), I expect the problem to take care of itself, through the increased use of contraception or abortion. It is possible, maybe even likely, that this class of people shall not responsibly use contraception or abortion in the way that I outlined (which is, on reflection, in their own interest), in which case my argument does not work.

[Heraclitus]

I'm quite aware of the dysgenic effects of many policies. Fortunatley there have been campaigns wich have sucesfully discouraged people with certain recesive traits from marying each other. Israel and Cyprus come to mind. For now its limited to diseases but I suspect real understainding of the genome and gene sequencing for around 300$ will in just a few decades provide much more benefits to the societies pragmatic enough not to outlaw them.




As to contraception and abortion. Isn't practically every step from using contraception properly to getting an abortion a test that the leass inteligent pass less frequently?

[Caligastia]

For instance, any policy which protects a parent from the consequences (responsibilities) of parenthood is one which naturally tends to provide an incentive for the unwise or incapable to have more children, as they know that these children will be supported by the state; on the other hand, absent this guarantee, these people would be far more careful to either use contraception, or abort a the fetus of a child they think they cannot support.

Seriously, I doubt that these people are thinking about consequences of any kind.