This feels...off. Maybe I don't get the core audience you're appealing to.
But when I contrast it to another "manifesto" I'm struck by the difference in priority. Comparing them, it's clear where one focuses on friends and relationships where your proposed core tenants are... correctly modeling human intelligence? Not specifically making one common mainstream mistake. I mean, I don't think the author I linked would disagree with 80% of what you've written here, and I don't think you'd disagree with what he wrote, but these generate very different outcomes.
I get old rationalism's core appeal: you're irrational, here's how to train yourself to be more rational. I get EA's core appeal: better charity saves more lives. I get the AI alignment thing: save the world. I'm not sure what this is, who this appeals to, unless you're full bore pro-eugenics.
Which...could actually be quite appealing. A basic pitch of "Actually, most of our social issues are caused by underlying genetic issues, therefore we should fix those" is actually kind of appealing but I'd want to be very explicit about that.
I’ve got to say I hate the label right wing. I’ve never been a leftie in the political sense but I would have lumped myself in with them because I was a cultural liberal. A freedom loving liberal. I still support access to abortion and gay marriage, although the push to deny biology has been a bridge too far. I’m suddenly right wing without having changed my views. Do I fit into some category or do I make up a new category? It all seems so beside the point.
I would imagine education skepticism would be an extremely common belief on the "rationalist right" also. Caplan and Hanson pretty much convinced me that formal education was overwhelmingly extremely wasteful signaling, and that the "human capital" explanation was bunk.
This is great. It distills a rationalist-worldview that I also share, but I've never seen articulated so clearly.
I think you nailed it on the head by focusing so heavily on genetics. Neither the mainstream left nor the mainstream right have even begun to grapple with what we've learned about genetics, and how that *must* alter our beliefs of what it means to be a fair and just society.
It also reflects my own personal political journey quite closely. Growing up, I held the same bog-standard liberal views as those around me. They weren't deeply considered beliefs, mind you, but just the water I swam in. Of course everyone has equal potential to succeed academically! Of course acheivement gaps are due to sexism/racism/Xism!
But when I discovered rationalism, everything changed. I can actually pick out the exact moment it happened: it was after reading Scott's infamous piece "The Atomic Bomb Considered As Hungarian High School Project". It had a tremendous impact on me. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't shake this feeling in the back of my head that there was something fundamentally wrong with my view of the world. I started devouring everything I could find on the topics of evolutionary psychology, behavioural genetics, psychometrics--and yes--even genetic group differences. I had a "Come to Jesus" moment: I realized that I couldn't reconcile left-wing views and my newfound understanding of human nature. So I moved to the right.
I completely agree with all of this. For those who are confused by 9, how an evolutionary worldview can lead to views on relationships and "gender roles" that are often considered "traditional"... Yes, it is true that monogamous marriage hasn't been a human universal; polygamy has been practiced by most cultures throughout most of history. Understanding EP doesn't lead to direct prescriptions or beliefs in what is inherently right or wrong, but it helps us understand the consequences of different things.
For example, it helps us understand that men have two possible mating strategies that can employ at different times or with different women: they can impregnate and abandon (cads) or commit and invest in offspring (dads). While women are attracted to mostly the same qualities in a man for short-term or long-term mating, but men tend to see women as belonging to one of two types. It helps us understand why men value chastity in potential wives, but not hookups. It helps us understand why a woman who is 30~40, who has been with many partners and has one or more kids is as attractive as a potential wife as an unemployed man who lives in his parents' basement is attractive to women. It helps us understand why a woman being independent, successful, accomplished, etc makes no more difference on the mating market than a man having a great shoe collection, and yet those things tend to make a woman feel she needs and is entitled to a man who is even more of those things...which is like an undesirable man feeling he needs and is entitled to a Victoria's secret model.
I recommend the book, The Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry. She makes many of the same points often made in the "manosphere", although there it's often tinged with male bitterness. And fair enough, lots of men have plenty to be bitter about (as do many women). But she still considers herself a feminist, in that she in concerned about the wellbeing of women in general (while attacking what she calls "liberal feminism", which promotes blank slatism, and paradoxically at the same time arguing that women should be more like men), and argues that hookup culture is bad for women. And it is. Only a minority of women at best can actually commitment-free sex the way most men do. Most end up feeling degraded and used. Most women want sex in the context of a loving and committed relationship. Sexual liberation gives license to the darker sides of male sexuality, at least for the few who can get away with it. It promotes hypergamy. It is also bad for most men, who end up alone. And that is bad for society, as young men are the most violent demographic, especially when they are unable to have sex. Polygamous societies often needed wars to get rid of the excess male population. The only people who benefit are the most desirable men.
These and other facts help us understand why married people are much happier, and why more monogamous societies tend to be more stable and prosperous.
I completely agree with all the other points, but I think this is a really crucial one where people make seriously bad choices with major consequences for their own lives on the basis on ideologically fashionable lies.
I am a bit late to the party, but having finished reading this, I think it is pretty much spot on. There probably could be another 20-30 tenets, but those base 10 are a really good start, and are definitely where the mismatch in the EA/Rationalist community seem to be with reality. (EA has a few other problems that I think warp their ability to focus on their apparent core purpose.) I think the Blank Slate model of humanity is probably the biggest wrong turn philosophy has created in the modern world, effectively starting everyone off on the wrong principle such that it is practically impossible to get back on the right track once it is accepted. Genetics isn't destiny, but that is closer to the truth than humans being infinitely malleable.
What country gets the level of inequality of outcomes best, in your mind? I did door to door sales in poor parts of the USA for a couple years and don't think children should grow up the way that I saw. Leads to both left and right wing views (more conservative beliefs about family, more support for health care for kids).
I'm also struck that technology changes the outcomes quite a bit. As things get more efficient there are more power laws. Think, for example, musicians now vs 100 years ago. So one could accept that inequalities are primarily the result of talent and still want to change the distribution of money. If AGI comes and most people can be replaced should those resources be funneled to the few financiers and programmers?
I think it's important to reiterate my disagreement with Richard (and it looks like with you) on calling this Right-wing. Except for the markets point, none of this is a moral claim. None of it is about what is good, beautiful, or right. They're simply factual claims that everyone who has enough experience in either the real world experience or with scientific paper-reading should agree with. Even the markets claim is not too far from this, if we shift it from "markets are good" to "markets historically give people things they consider good".
It also reveals some asymmetries about the current regime. No one is making "left-wing rationalism" with the tenets that:
- Covid vaccines reduce severe illness and death
- Immigration on average raises per capita GDP
- The Earth is more than 5000 years old
- Evolution is true
- Some women are able to competently work in technical areas
It's difficult even to speculate what parts of reality a right-wing regime would deny. That's how asymmetric the warfare is right now. Consequently I think branding reality as "right wing" is not beneficial either to reality or to the right, whatever that is. It's just painting a target on important truths that, if recognized, would benefit everyone, not just right wingers.
> We are in an evolutionary mismatch: Since we recognize we are not blank slates, we should also recognize that our brains evolved to be adaptive to specific environments. The present environment is very different from our ancestors, and it may make us happier to embrace more traditional lifestyles. On the rationalist right, there is more skepticism around the practicality and utility of polyamory, promiscuity, substance use, and atheism. There is more sympathy for Christianity, having children, and the genders adopting their respective gender roles. The right also seems to like older and more traditional aesthetics in architecture, artwork, clothing, etc.
It would seem like the traditional lifestyle you have in mind is one of the relatively recent past. While we are not evolutionarily matched to modernity, neither are we evolutionarily matched to those traditions.
Why do you favor mass immigration? Most immigration to high IQ countries is from low IQ countries and leads to a lowering of living standards in high IQ countries, to say nothing of the problems associated with ethnic diversity in itself.
I don’t consider myself of the right, but I agree with all ten tenets. Indeed, I would love to see a genuine attempt at refuting any of them.
This feels...off. Maybe I don't get the core audience you're appealing to.
But when I contrast it to another "manifesto" I'm struck by the difference in priority. Comparing them, it's clear where one focuses on friends and relationships where your proposed core tenants are... correctly modeling human intelligence? Not specifically making one common mainstream mistake. I mean, I don't think the author I linked would disagree with 80% of what you've written here, and I don't think you'd disagree with what he wrote, but these generate very different outcomes.
I get old rationalism's core appeal: you're irrational, here's how to train yourself to be more rational. I get EA's core appeal: better charity saves more lives. I get the AI alignment thing: save the world. I'm not sure what this is, who this appeals to, unless you're full bore pro-eugenics.
Which...could actually be quite appealing. A basic pitch of "Actually, most of our social issues are caused by underlying genetic issues, therefore we should fix those" is actually kind of appealing but I'd want to be very explicit about that.
(1) https://twitter.com/GreeneMan6/status/1581362989311348738?cxt=HHwWhMDS7dTQkPIrAAAA
I’ve got to say I hate the label right wing. I’ve never been a leftie in the political sense but I would have lumped myself in with them because I was a cultural liberal. A freedom loving liberal. I still support access to abortion and gay marriage, although the push to deny biology has been a bridge too far. I’m suddenly right wing without having changed my views. Do I fit into some category or do I make up a new category? It all seems so beside the point.
I would imagine education skepticism would be an extremely common belief on the "rationalist right" also. Caplan and Hanson pretty much convinced me that formal education was overwhelmingly extremely wasteful signaling, and that the "human capital" explanation was bunk.
This is great. It distills a rationalist-worldview that I also share, but I've never seen articulated so clearly.
I think you nailed it on the head by focusing so heavily on genetics. Neither the mainstream left nor the mainstream right have even begun to grapple with what we've learned about genetics, and how that *must* alter our beliefs of what it means to be a fair and just society.
It also reflects my own personal political journey quite closely. Growing up, I held the same bog-standard liberal views as those around me. They weren't deeply considered beliefs, mind you, but just the water I swam in. Of course everyone has equal potential to succeed academically! Of course acheivement gaps are due to sexism/racism/Xism!
But when I discovered rationalism, everything changed. I can actually pick out the exact moment it happened: it was after reading Scott's infamous piece "The Atomic Bomb Considered As Hungarian High School Project". It had a tremendous impact on me. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't shake this feeling in the back of my head that there was something fundamentally wrong with my view of the world. I started devouring everything I could find on the topics of evolutionary psychology, behavioural genetics, psychometrics--and yes--even genetic group differences. I had a "Come to Jesus" moment: I realized that I couldn't reconcile left-wing views and my newfound understanding of human nature. So I moved to the right.
I completely agree with all of this. For those who are confused by 9, how an evolutionary worldview can lead to views on relationships and "gender roles" that are often considered "traditional"... Yes, it is true that monogamous marriage hasn't been a human universal; polygamy has been practiced by most cultures throughout most of history. Understanding EP doesn't lead to direct prescriptions or beliefs in what is inherently right or wrong, but it helps us understand the consequences of different things.
For example, it helps us understand that men have two possible mating strategies that can employ at different times or with different women: they can impregnate and abandon (cads) or commit and invest in offspring (dads). While women are attracted to mostly the same qualities in a man for short-term or long-term mating, but men tend to see women as belonging to one of two types. It helps us understand why men value chastity in potential wives, but not hookups. It helps us understand why a woman who is 30~40, who has been with many partners and has one or more kids is as attractive as a potential wife as an unemployed man who lives in his parents' basement is attractive to women. It helps us understand why a woman being independent, successful, accomplished, etc makes no more difference on the mating market than a man having a great shoe collection, and yet those things tend to make a woman feel she needs and is entitled to a man who is even more of those things...which is like an undesirable man feeling he needs and is entitled to a Victoria's secret model.
I recommend the book, The Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry. She makes many of the same points often made in the "manosphere", although there it's often tinged with male bitterness. And fair enough, lots of men have plenty to be bitter about (as do many women). But she still considers herself a feminist, in that she in concerned about the wellbeing of women in general (while attacking what she calls "liberal feminism", which promotes blank slatism, and paradoxically at the same time arguing that women should be more like men), and argues that hookup culture is bad for women. And it is. Only a minority of women at best can actually commitment-free sex the way most men do. Most end up feeling degraded and used. Most women want sex in the context of a loving and committed relationship. Sexual liberation gives license to the darker sides of male sexuality, at least for the few who can get away with it. It promotes hypergamy. It is also bad for most men, who end up alone. And that is bad for society, as young men are the most violent demographic, especially when they are unable to have sex. Polygamous societies often needed wars to get rid of the excess male population. The only people who benefit are the most desirable men.
These and other facts help us understand why married people are much happier, and why more monogamous societies tend to be more stable and prosperous.
I completely agree with all the other points, but I think this is a really crucial one where people make seriously bad choices with major consequences for their own lives on the basis on ideologically fashionable lies.
Is there anything anyone can do that's more effective than having kids with PGT-P, and doing public splashy interviews like the Collins family did?
I am a bit late to the party, but having finished reading this, I think it is pretty much spot on. There probably could be another 20-30 tenets, but those base 10 are a really good start, and are definitely where the mismatch in the EA/Rationalist community seem to be with reality. (EA has a few other problems that I think warp their ability to focus on their apparent core purpose.) I think the Blank Slate model of humanity is probably the biggest wrong turn philosophy has created in the modern world, effectively starting everyone off on the wrong principle such that it is practically impossible to get back on the right track once it is accepted. Genetics isn't destiny, but that is closer to the truth than humans being infinitely malleable.
What country gets the level of inequality of outcomes best, in your mind? I did door to door sales in poor parts of the USA for a couple years and don't think children should grow up the way that I saw. Leads to both left and right wing views (more conservative beliefs about family, more support for health care for kids).
I'm also struck that technology changes the outcomes quite a bit. As things get more efficient there are more power laws. Think, for example, musicians now vs 100 years ago. So one could accept that inequalities are primarily the result of talent and still want to change the distribution of money. If AGI comes and most people can be replaced should those resources be funneled to the few financiers and programmers?
Why the enthusiasm for immigration?
Brilliant stuff.
Meng Hu's new review is on point https://humanvarieties.org/2022/12/22/schooling-enhances-iq-not-intelligence/
Excellent
I think it's important to reiterate my disagreement with Richard (and it looks like with you) on calling this Right-wing. Except for the markets point, none of this is a moral claim. None of it is about what is good, beautiful, or right. They're simply factual claims that everyone who has enough experience in either the real world experience or with scientific paper-reading should agree with. Even the markets claim is not too far from this, if we shift it from "markets are good" to "markets historically give people things they consider good".
It also reveals some asymmetries about the current regime. No one is making "left-wing rationalism" with the tenets that:
- Covid vaccines reduce severe illness and death
- Immigration on average raises per capita GDP
- The Earth is more than 5000 years old
- Evolution is true
- Some women are able to competently work in technical areas
It's difficult even to speculate what parts of reality a right-wing regime would deny. That's how asymmetric the warfare is right now. Consequently I think branding reality as "right wing" is not beneficial either to reality or to the right, whatever that is. It's just painting a target on important truths that, if recognized, would benefit everyone, not just right wingers.
> We are in an evolutionary mismatch: Since we recognize we are not blank slates, we should also recognize that our brains evolved to be adaptive to specific environments. The present environment is very different from our ancestors, and it may make us happier to embrace more traditional lifestyles. On the rationalist right, there is more skepticism around the practicality and utility of polyamory, promiscuity, substance use, and atheism. There is more sympathy for Christianity, having children, and the genders adopting their respective gender roles. The right also seems to like older and more traditional aesthetics in architecture, artwork, clothing, etc.
It would seem like the traditional lifestyle you have in mind is one of the relatively recent past. While we are not evolutionarily matched to modernity, neither are we evolutionarily matched to those traditions.
Why do you favor mass immigration? Most immigration to high IQ countries is from low IQ countries and leads to a lowering of living standards in high IQ countries, to say nothing of the problems associated with ethnic diversity in itself.