…and this is a 
Michael Medved says something dumb
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Posted on: May 14, 2008 12:34 PM, by PZ Myers
Did someone declare this National Flaming Racist Idiot week, and I just didn't notice until now? You have got to read Michael Medved's latest foray into pseudoscience: he has declared American superiority to be genetic, encoded in our good old American DNA. Because our ancestors were immigrants, who were risk-takers, who were selected for their energy and aggressiveness. Oh, except for those who are descended from slaves.
The idea of a distinctive, unifying, risk-taking American DNA might also help to explain our most persistent and painful racial divide - between the progeny of every immigrant nationality that chose to come here, and the one significant group that exercised no choice in making their journey to the U.S. Nothing in the horrific ordeal of African slaves, seized from their homes against their will, reflected a genetic predisposition to risk-taking, or any sort of self-selection based on personality traits.
But, he hastens to add, modern African-American genetics have been leavened with the genes of recent, self-selected immigrants from the Caribbean and Africa, so their unfortunate stay-at-home genes have a "less decisive influence".
As is usual for Medved, a dullard incapable of any kind of thought beyond the superficial, he doesn't think his thesis through. Wouldn't this imply that Moslem immigrants to Europe, with their risk-taking willingness to move to new environments, are their true hope for the future? That the old blue-bloods of this country are less fit than, say, the Nisei? And if the descendants of African slaves are not successful go-getters because their arrival was coerced, what about the immigrants who were fleeing religious persecution, or all the Americans who are descended from indentured servants? Are there no successful entrepreneurs in Europe or Asia or Africa? Should we give extra bonus points to the descendants of nomadic tribes of warriors, like the Germans? It's a very peculiarly narrow view of a kind of simplistic genetic determinism that ignores the complexities and the varieties of ways people got here to promote a ridiculous premise.
And it just gets sillier.
Senators Obama, Clinton and other leaders who seek to enlarge the scope of government face more formidable obstacles than they realize. Their desire to impose a European-style welfare state and a command-and-control economy not only contradicts our proudest political and economic traditions, but the new revelations about American DNA suggest that such ill-starred schemes may go against our very nature.
Uh, what? Republican policies are now part of our genetic nature, and the Democrats will be defeated by our capitalist genes?
This is Michael Medved of the Discovery Institute, an organization that has recently been raving about the evils of eugenics and the soulless Darwinian view of nature. Yet here he is, spouting off the kind of smug, invalid, pseudo-biological jingo that belongs in the Gilded Age and would be comfortable in the mouth of a robber baron trying to justify a war in Latin America. It's nothing but handwaving rationalizations for an intrinsic superiority to our tribe, with a complete absence of evidence.
Comments
This is Michael Medved of the Discovery Institute
So, presumably he doesn't accept evolution.
You mean, it's possible for people to come up with pseudo-scientific justifications for their racism and nationalism without recourse to Darwin's theories?
Someone notify Ben Stein!
Posted by: Jen R | May 14, 2008 12:40 PM
The idea of a distinctive, unifying, risk-taking American DNA might also help to explain our most persistent and painful racial divide - between the progeny of every immigrant nationality that chose to come here, and the one significant group that exercised no choice in making their journey to the U.S. Nothing in the horrific ordeal of African slaves, seized from their homes against their will, reflected a genetic predisposition to risk-taking, or any sort of self-selection based on personality traits.
And of course, because slave owners never raped their slaves, contemporary African Americans don't share any genetic material with those risk taking rapists.
Now, cue someone to excuse and celebrate their own ignorance.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | May 14, 2008 12:41 PM
For your header, you really could just leave it at "Michael Medved." We would infer that he just said something dumb, because he generally does.
Posted by: beagledad | May 14, 2008 12:41 PM
Wow, Medved's comments are so stupid beyond belief I'm at a lost to say anything.
Posted by: Doug | May 14, 2008 12:42 PM
I like this guy, although i think he missed something. Us surviving Europeans stayed behind to confront our problems instead of running away from them like cowards. Therefore, American genes are pretty much the wastebin of our species.
Thank you very much, i'll be here all night.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | May 14, 2008 12:46 PM
The title of this post would lose no meaning in being exactly one word shorter.
Posted by: Emmet Caulfield | May 14, 2008 12:46 PM
PZ,
You may need to work on your headlines. ;)
Blaring "Michael Medved says something dumb" is the equivalent of proclaiming "the Earth is not flat".
Posted by: nkb | May 14, 2008 12:47 PM
Wow, they really just know enough about science to be dangerous with it it? I mean how do you parody a statement that dumb?
Posted by: Bob L | May 14, 2008 12:47 PM
Weirdly enough Chris Rock has a strange version of this. Something about the descendants of slaves being selected for physical prowess or something. I think he called them "super slaves".
I have to admit, there might actually be something to the Chris Rock thing. I'm a little suspect though.
Posted by: Jams | May 14, 2008 12:49 PM
...I'm also suspicious.
Posted by: Jams | May 14, 2008 12:50 PM
What I find ironic is that there is a tiny "Flag this comment as offensive" on comments, but strangely enough it is not an option on the original article.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton | May 14, 2008 12:51 PM
So does this mean all of those "energetic" and "agressive" folks from south of the Rio Grande who are vigorously choosing to come here as well have his stamp of approval? Where does he draw the line? I mean, they have brownish skin. Surely his idea of superior genetics stops at skin color, even if the very same behavior he praises is exhibited in other "tribes."
Unfortunately, there is a large portion of the voting public who will agree with his "scientific" explanation of politics.
Posted by: Paul Lamb | May 14, 2008 12:52 PM
#9, that's actually a little bit more reasonable. That was ACTUAL and well-recorded artificial selection (seriously, people were deliberately bred like cattle), and on things which are definitely and obviously genetically based. Of course, the slave-owners got their own randomly shitty genes all mixed up in there by raping enslaved women, so apply salt as necessary.
And Michael Medved makes me nostalgic for the '90s. And by that I mean 1890s.
Posted by: octopod | May 14, 2008 12:52 PM
Sounds like the kind of 'theory' a university freshman would come up with after three pitchers of Kokanee in order to impress a Poli Sci major without tipping her off that he's never really read Leviathan after all.
What a fucking wannabe.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | May 14, 2008 12:53 PM
Couldn't you draw the exact opposite of this conclusion, using the same dim-witted logic?
Is America made up of all the losers that couldn't deal with adversity in their original countries, and took the cowardly approach of fleeing, instead of standing up and fighting through it?
Posted by: nkb | May 14, 2008 12:53 PM
There is nothing surprising here. DI doesn't "get" science. The them, science is just a word one invokes in an attempt to establish credibility.
Medved has a conclusion he'd like to reach, generates "data," and whaddaya know? The data points fit the "hypothesis." Science!
Posted by: Jim Battle | May 14, 2008 12:54 PM
You mean that he thinks selection works?
All in all, though, this is great. The only thing missing from Ben Stein's self-destruction was that he wasn't a fellow of the DI.
Medved decided to be the DI fellow who would jump the shark in the eyes of those dull enough to still think that the DI might be a think tank, instead of a propaganda tank.
Anyhow, watch your own last shreds of respect tank, Medved. But be sure to hang on to the DI for dear life as it does, since you could be the anchor that drags them into Davy Jones' locker.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Posted by: Glen Davidson | May 14, 2008 12:56 PM
I've always wondered if anyone ever compared dental stats to see if african-americans today have "profited" from the selection imposed on them by the traders of their forefathers.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | May 14, 2008 1:01 PM
I wonder what he has to say about Australian DNA ...
Posted by: Forodrim | May 14, 2008 1:05 PM
No, no, give the poor man a chance. He is a scientist and he has put forward a testable hypothesis. Now, lets assume that the descendants of immigrants do all have ruggedly individualistic American Conservative politics etched in every cell of their bodies. That gives us predictions. We would expect for example to find that none of Canada, Brazil or New Zealand would have well developed welfare states or ever have had left wing governments.
Now how to test these predictions...
Posted by: Matt Heath | May 14, 2008 1:06 PM
Wouldn't the implication be that African-Americans should be slow runners?
Posted by: Curt Cameron | May 14, 2008 1:06 PM
And to think that John McCain accepted an invitation to speak to these Discovery Institute yahoos and no one seems to care.
Posted by: Allen | May 14, 2008 1:07 PM
Do the two books Medved cites actually agree with this view of genetics?
Posted by: Tosser | May 14, 2008 1:09 PM
Given their early history, I'm wondering what Medved would say about (European-derived) Australians.
Posted by: Hank Fox | May 14, 2008 1:09 PM
I always thought that African-Americans whose ancestors survived the hell of the Middle Passage and the torture of slavery and racism would be all the tougher for it. That's a legacy--the people who survived and thrived must have had some kind of fortitude. I'd be proud to be their decendant.
Medved is an ass.
Posted by: Linda | May 14, 2008 1:10 PM
And also don't forget, that if the DI or their supporters ever did 'win', Medved's gibberish is what ALL science in America would look like.
Europe, India and China would probably get a hearty laugh out of it, tho.
Posted by: George Cauldron | May 14, 2008 1:11 PM
Forget Medved -- It's all the Kaiser's fault.
http://adamant.typepad.com/page/2/
Posted by: Russell | May 14, 2008 1:12 PM
Hey, I'm sure the Discovery Institute will soon put out a press release denouncing these comments, and explain how they aren't the Institutes views [/sarcasm]
Posted by: Dennis N | May 14, 2008 1:12 PM
Medved is parroting it, but Peter C. Whybrow came up with it.
Medved: "Whybrow explained to the New York Times Magazine that immigrants to the United States and their descendents seemed to possess a distinctive makeup of their "dopamine receptor system - the pathway in the brain that figures centrally in boldness and novelty seeking.""
Bill McKibben blurbed American Mania, the book in which Whybrow presents this theory.
From Whybrow's website:
"Peter C. Whybrow, M.D. is Director of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior (previously known as the Neuropsychiatric Institute) at the University of California in Los Angeles."
But theories about alleged personality differences between populations related to dopamine receptor alleles are not unique to Whybrow.
In our genes. 2002. Henry Harpending and Gregory Cochran. PNAS. 99: 10-12
"A survey of world frequencies of DRD4 alleles has shown striking differences among populations, with population differences greater than those of most neutral markers. ... (T)he allele associated with ADHD has increased a lot in frequency within the last few thousands to tens of thousands of years...
There are at least two hypotheses to explain the world distribution of 7R. The first ... is that it is a dispersal morph. They argue that the allele increases the likelihood that its bearers migrate. As modern humans colonized the earth, bearers of 7R were more likely to be movers so that populations far away from their ancient places of origin have, in effect, concentrated 7R. ...
The second hypothesis is that 7R bearers enjoy a reproductive advantage in male-competitive societies, either in competition for food as children or in face-to-face and local group male competition. Societies in which this advantage would be present were rare before the spread of agriculture, but common after it."
Note that Harpending and Cochran are two of the authors of the recently hyped 'accelerated human evolution' paper.
Posted by: Colugo | May 14, 2008 1:12 PM
#26
Not so much. We don't want to have to have our OWN governments fund out post-doc positions.
Posted by: Matt Heath | May 14, 2008 1:13 PM
It is amazing to me that he can tout the fact that Americans have their own specific DNA and someone will still employ him. As long as racists are still on this planet, they will try to find empirical support for the basis of their prejudices. And genetics will continue to be their favored area, because if they can establish a difference on the genetic level, then their arrogance will at least have a physical base, if not still completely morally irreconcilable. Once someone isn't "the same as us," in these views, they're less somehow valuable and can be discriminated against, or even exterminated, without reproach.
Medved is an idiot, bigot, and educated enough to let the rest of us know just how ignorant and misguided he and his cronies are over at the Discovery Institute
Posted by: brokenSoldier | May 14, 2008 1:15 PM
"Nevertheless, two respected professors of psychiatry have recently come out with challenging books that contend that those who chose to settle this country in every generation possessed crucial common traits that they passed on to their descendents."
Wow, I know I always go to psychiatrists for my genetics information. Later today I'm going to talk to my astrophysicist about my fear of flying.
Posted by: azqaz | May 14, 2008 1:15 PM
So, let's review:
Somebody cherry-picks an aspect of the science of genetics, warps it into something that can only be charitably described as pseudo-science, and bandies it about as proof-positive of the superiority of one population over others.
Now why am I thinking about a certain European country, circa 1934? No reason, I guess...
Posted by: Raynfala | May 14, 2008 1:17 PM
In addition to its multiple layers of stupid, it's also a covert racist explanation for why Blacks don't vote for Medved's beloved GOP. Expect a *lot* more of that over the next 6 months.
Posted by: George Cauldron | May 14, 2008 1:18 PM
Has Medved been seen wearing a Curious George t-shirt recently? Just wondering . . .
Posted by: beagledad | May 14, 2008 1:19 PM
Wait a sec... wouldn't our USAUSAUSA! DNA be more rightly comprised of cowards who were fleeing religious and other persecution in their home countries, rather than take a courageous stand in their homeland and try to change things there?
And later on, was it really "risk taking" or was it simple greed and or lazy indulgence to travel to "the land of milk and honey" and try to increase your lot?
I have a feeling Mr. Medved hasn't fully analyzed his idea here...
Posted by: jfatz | May 14, 2008 1:20 PM
His understanding of genetics would fit right in in 1930s Germany.
Posted by: JakeS | May 14, 2008 1:24 PM
This does go a long way in explaining why there's so many religious nut jobs around. Their ancestors were so insufferable in Europe that they were driven away. It's in their DNA.
Posted by: Dennis N | May 14, 2008 1:25 PM
If one accepts Medved's simplistic notion of evolutionary psychology, one could draw very different conclusions from his. Many of the original European settlers in the Americas were religious cranks who had to come here because people in their countries of origin found them insufferable. (See, e.g., "the Pilgrims" who settled in Massachusetts.) One would then conclude that the U.S. is infested with insufferable religious cranks, which would be . . . hey, wait a minute, maybe there's something to this Medved guy!
Posted by: beagledad | May 14, 2008 1:26 PM
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I think there is something to the idea that immigrants tend to be more productive and their kids do better in school, but I don't think it is in their genes. Clearly there is an advantage to the personality that is motivated to seek a better life elsewhere and will likely expect more from their own children. But to say that this is encoded in their genes is pretty ridiculous.
So I guess Medved would advocate giving citizenship to all the illegal immigrants in America because they have this "American gene"? I somehow doubt it.
But I would, not for their genes, but for their motivation and determination. I figure if an immigrant managed to get here and get a job and be productive, then that's the kind of people we want as citizens. Filling out a W-4 should be an automatic green card.
Posted by: SteveM | May 14, 2008 1:28 PM
I am Sorry What American superiority?
Posted by: adam | May 14, 2008 1:29 PM
JakeS @ 37
Personnaly, I think his understanding of Genetics would fit. right. here >.
Posted by: tony | May 14, 2008 1:29 PM
Forget about Medved for a second. We all know that he is an ass and an ignoramus. A more interesting question is why there has hardly been a peep in the science blogosphere about the rising trend of research in dopamine receptor variants and personality differences, as well as related studies on alleged inter-population cognitive and affective differences. This is carried out and published not by movie critics at crackpot think tanks, but prestigious scientific institutions and journals. We can flay Medved all we want, but this isn't going away. It's only going to get bigger.
Posted by: Colugo | May 14, 2008 1:31 PM
But tony, Medved used the words "dopamine receptor system," so he sounds all scientificish and everything! How can you doubt the depth of his knowledge?
Posted by: beagledad | May 14, 2008 1:32 PM
Manifest Destiny with a pseudo-scientific bent. Sickening.
Posted by: Etha Williams | May 14, 2008 1:33 PM
"Because our ancestors were immigrants, who were risk-takers, who were selected for their energy and aggressiveness."
It is not often that the author of a statement such as this can be the living counterpoint to their own arguement. Mr Medved should really try and cough up some of that aggressive energy and apply it to revealing some evidence for their Intelligent Design hypothesis. What with a genetic advantage in risk-taking you would think they would have that all pegged down by now.
Then again maybe we can just file him in with Junk DNA Hmmm?
Posted by: WTF | May 14, 2008 1:33 PM
It's not really all that original of an idea, either. I remember hearing it from certain relatives while growing up in the '80s.
Posted by: Fatboy | May 14, 2008 1:34 PM
Eh what?
...that is all.
Posted by: Michelle | May 14, 2008 1:34 PM
Hmm - while we're discussing American DNA, how did all those nuclear tests work out for you?...
Posted by: Phoenician in a time of Romans | May 14, 2008 1:35 PM
Michael Medved:
The stupid, it doesn't just burn, it sears with the power of a thermonuclear bomb of dumb.
Posted by: Orac | May 14, 2008 1:41 PM
Colugo (#43) posits,
True, but it's Medved's interpretations on such phenomenon that is being flayed and ridiculed.
There are better ways of understanding the research than making half-assed patriotic/racist pronouncements.
I can think of a few myself, but that's really not the point.
Posted by: Ryan F Stello | May 14, 2008 1:42 PM
Somebody cherry-picks an aspect of the science of genetics, warps it into something that can only be charitably described as pseudo-science, and bandies it about as proof-positive of the superiority of one population over others.
Now why am I thinking about a certain European country, circa 1934? No reason, I guess...
Spin it anyway you want - it's all science's fault.
I know because Mr Stein told me so.
Posted by: Tushar | May 14, 2008 1:50 PM
My ancestors were exiled from Scotland for backing the wrong side in a bid for independence. So I guess I'm a genetic malcontent who can't pick the right side of a conflict
Posted by: ddr | May 14, 2008 1:50 PM
I thought Medved was a film critic. That must be where he gets his ideas about Americans, in the movies they are all bold and clever. Most of the ones I know are just fat and lazy.
Posted by: Darwin's Dagger | May 14, 2008 1:52 PM
There may well be something to his comments. New Scientist once published a graph of the number of patents authored by people in Scotland over the period when many of the best inventors left for the US. The graph plummeted initially but after a few decades began to rise again.
So, presumably after a few generations the mix of smart, inventive people rose as random changes came back.
My theory for the US is the reverse happened. All the smart and inventive people came over to the US and then over the generations have dumbed down to a normal distribution.
Chris P
Posted by: Chris P | May 14, 2008 1:52 PM
"True, but it's Medved's interpretations on such phenomenon that is being flayed and ridiculed."
Right; journalists and pundits always distort and simplify any kind of human bio-behavioral research, whether the topic is hormones, neurology, or genetics - and whether are endorsing or critiquing it. However, the scientific researchers are themselves interpreting their data. And among their interpretations is that genetic variants in dopamine receptors helps explain cultural differences and historical events. Michael Medved didn't make that up.
Of course the Discovery Institute is a more tempting target of (well deserved) derision than is PNAS, UCLA, or other institutions engaged in developing and publishing this growing body of research and theory.
Posted by: Colugo | May 14, 2008 1:53 PM
This one is easy to refute. The european immigrants to America came here usually because they could not inherit property-they were not firstborn sons. Hence, their arrival was spurred by environment (inheritance tradition), not genetics.
Posted by: Justin | May 14, 2008 1:53 PM
Is it just me, or has he been taking colloidal silver?
http://images.michaelmedved.com/images/bio/bio6.jpg
Posted by: JessC | May 14, 2008 1:55 PM
Forodrim @ #19:
Little English Girl: "Mummy, I want to go to Australia."
Mum: "Hush, dear, that's where they send the criminals."
Little Australian Girl: "Mummy, I want to go to England."
Mum: "Hush, dear, that's where the criminals come from."
Posted by: beagledad | May 14, 2008 1:56 PM
I thought the supposed problem with Darwinism was that it's racist. I guess "microevolution" has the same problem.
Posted by: "Q" the Enchanter | May 14, 2008 1:56 PM
I'm trying to figure out how this isn't a form of eugenics. WTF?
Posted by: Mena | May 14, 2008 1:56 PM
Economists have been making similar arguments, sometimes in contradictory ways. For example, you can read arguments that slave trading damaged the basic fabrics of African societies by removing skilled or intelligent people - and then you find the opposite argument about immigrants from Mexico coming here and being more productive because those immigrants, some economists argue, the more motivated workers. These ideas are crap and reflect a form of observer bias.
Posted by: jonathan | May 14, 2008 1:58 PM
People like medved are living arguments against their thesis.
Posted by: Snark7 | May 14, 2008 1:58 PM
Bwahahaha! Brain scans already suggest that political conservatives are less flexible than self-identified liberals (is anyone surprised?).
http://tiny.cc/rkPiE
"Brain recordings taken using electroencephalogram (EEG) technology showed that liberals had twice as much activity in a deep region called the anterior cingulate cortex. This area of the brain is thought to act as a mental brake by helping the mind recognize "no-go" situations where it must refrain from the usual course of action."
In any event, it would be dangerous to extrapolate genetically linked personality traits from generations past. We Yankees are descended from risk-takers, true. Also, those who ran away from debts, criminal charges, and many who simply wanted the easy wealth from cities whose streets were paved with gold. And the religiously intolerant. And convicted criminals. And the second sons of farmers, with no inheritance expected.
Personalities are complex expressions of many interacting genes, and cultural and familial environments.
Posted by: Kermit | May 14, 2008 1:59 PM
Did this guy write one of those "Politcally Incorrect Guides". He reads just like one of them.
That is to say, wrong.
Posted by: SpotWeld | May 14, 2008 2:01 PM
"Accelerated human evolution" indeed. Whatever legitimate questions regarding dopamine receptor variants, personality differences, and alleged inter-population differences there may be, I don't see how anyone is going to see any effect on DNA based on selective pressures that are only a few hundred years old at most, and contaminated by many contingencies and nuances.
Medved's position here reminds me of the Creationist position that "macro-evolution" is too implausible to have happened, but after the Ark landed all general animal "kinds" began to split into millions of variant micro-species at a dizzying rate.
Posted by: Sastra | May 14, 2008 2:04 PM
Allen wrote: And to think that John McCain accepted an invitation to speak to these Discovery Institute yahoos and no one seems to care.
Indeed. I once thought that if I were ever going to vote for any Republitard it perhaps might maybe possibly could be McCain. I mean, he actually has the experience I would want in a Commander-in-Chief (i.e., knows what it sounds like when rounds are fired at you in anger) and has stood for some good things in the past or at least has nodded his head in the right direction (e.g., McCain-Feingold; Lieberman-McCain).
And then he gave a talk at Liberty "University" or some similar "educational" institution.
Done.
The DI thing, well...I dunno...super done?
Posted by: Josh | May 14, 2008 2:04 PM
I'm a Scot by birth, with 100% Irish ancestors.
My grandparents moved to scotland as a result of the irish potato famine.
Does that make them 'risk takers' or 'avoiders'?
My eldest brother moved to Canada when 22, and subsequently returned to Scotland with his wife after the birth of their son (and has ultimately been quite successful in his career). Are they 'risk takers' or 'avoiders'?
I have lived in five different countries, and worked in many more, since my mid 20s. I now live in the US.
Does that make me a 'risk taker' or 'avoider'?
Sounds to me like an a priori answer looking for somewhat conformant research, and definitely. not. science!
Tony
Posted by: tony | May 14, 2008 2:05 PM
I always thought McCain was a decent guy, I think he's just doing a lot of pandering these past few years.
Posted by: Dennis N | May 14, 2008 2:05 PM
Crikey! All you need to do now is link to something by David Klinghoffer, and you'll have have some sort of idiot Trifecta.
Posted by: Aaron Baker | May 14, 2008 2:07 PM
Re: McCain.
John McCain is a politician.
The only difference between a lawyer and a politician... a lawyer will stay bought!
;)
Tony
Posted by: tony | May 14, 2008 2:09 PM
Well, he's got to do SOMETHING while he's waiting to discover BigFoot. Really. It's in his bio.
Medved is actually PERFECT. A perfect example of the kind of idiotic moron attracted to the failed people, policies and positions of the "Discovery" Institute.
Posted by: J-Dog | May 14, 2008 2:10 PM
You know, this really makes me mad, because my wife is an immigrant. I think hopping onto a boat and crossing from Vietnam to Hong Kong, then living in a refugee camp, then coming to America, then graduating from a university, required her to have about 50 times as much bravery as Medved has.
I find his assertion very insulting. What a dick.
I take this one kinda personally.
Posted by: MikeM | May 14, 2008 2:13 PM
And Texas was largely settled by hillbillies whose poor social skills got them run out of Appalachia by other hillbillies.
(I'm of largely Scottish->Appalachian->Texan stock myself--my family tree is a wreath.)
Gee, this evolution stuff explains a lot, including our "outlaw country" and "psychobilly" music.
Posted by: Paul W. | May 14, 2008 2:15 PM
Sastra: "I don't see how anyone is going to see any effect on DNA based on selective pressures that are only a few hundred years old at most, and contaminated by many contingencies and nuances."
Very few in the blogosphere discerned the possible implications of the 'accelerated evolution paper' for human group differences in cognition and temperament, even though some of the authors - especially Harpending - were happy to point them out.
Earlier there was Harpending and Cochran's 'smart Jews' theory, relating current Ashkenazim high IQ to selection within the ghettos of Europe. Also the recent book Farewell to Alms by economist Gregory Clark, relating the rise of bourgeois values to genetic selective advantage in the last few hundred years.
This dopamine-culture-history stuff is only one facet of a larger body of research on human population differences that combines population genetics, endocrinology and neurology, and social science.
Posted by: Colugo | May 14, 2008 2:24 PM
The book "Survival of the Sickest" addresses the possibility that some higher incidence of certain illnesses in African-Americans (high blood pressure, diabetes) might be a genetic legacy from surviving the Middle Passage. The book is quite speculative and some of the attempts at humor are eye-rollingly stupid, but at least it's not, you know...Medved stupid.
Posted by: Greg Peterson | May 14, 2008 2:26 PM
Maybe our ancestors gave us the appalling "manifest destiny" gene, and so we need to voluntarily kill ourselves off while there's still some vestige of compassion left in isolated pockets of the gene pool?
Posted by: M. Robert Bond | May 14, 2008 2:27 PM
"Michael Medved says something dumb"
Whoa, stop the presses!
Posted by: roddg | May 14, 2008 2:29 PM
Wow. Good to see we're still #1 at someting, even if it's "racist just-so stories that would be laughable if they weren't so stupid". America--Fuck Yeah!
Also, how does this theory square with the Brown Menace who're invading us to have "anchor babies" and live on the dole?
Or with, arguably, the bravest immigrants of all--the proto-Native Americans who immigrated, 30K years ago, to a continent that still had frikkin MAMMOTHS, not to mention dire wolves and dire bears. Which they fought with bits of sharpened rock. Doesn't their DNA count or something?
Anyway, *I* am descended, in part, from fierce Viking warriors (who, by the way, are genetically indisposed to creating a welfare state--that's why they're still out there, raiding Northern Europe in their mighty longboats), so I'm sure Medved won't mind if I go kick his ass. It's in my genes.
Posted by: Nightsky | May 14, 2008 2:30 PM
We're all very different people.
We're not Watusi.
We're not Spartans.
We're Americans.
With a capital A, huh?
You know what that means?
Do you? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world.
We are the wretched refuse.
We're the underdog.
We're mutts.
- Here's proof. His nose is cold.
- So is his brain.
But there's no animal
that's more faithful, that's more loyal,more loveable than the mutt.
-- Bill Murray, Stripes
Posted by: OriGuy | May 14, 2008 2:30 PM
#71:You know, this really makes me mad, because my wife is an immigrant.
You completely missed Medved's point. He is saying that people like your wife are the "true Americans" and have some kind of special gene common to all the other immigrants that had to fight and claw their way here. The racism is when he examines the converse, that all those who were dragged here kicking and screaming (in slave ships) must therefore lack this special gene and so explains their "listlessness" and poverty. Couldn't be due to oppression, no, it must be their genes, and it is the genes of the "true immigrants" that entitles them to their positions of superiority.
So be angry at Medved for his racism, but not that it is directed at your wife (apparently).
So, is this Medved's real opinion or is he trying to use this as an argument to discredit "Darwinism"? "See, this is where Darwinism leads to racism" bullshit. See, by applying the rules of darwinian selection to human immigration, I can come up with a thoroughly hateful conclusion. Therefore Darwin was wrong, evil, and a racist and his evil theory must be rejected. Is this what he is doing?
Posted by: SteveM | May 14, 2008 2:33 PM
Gosh, this Herr Professor Doktor Medved makes it sound like the waves of immigrants to the ol' U.S. of A. were all self-motivated entrepreneurial futurists with a keen eye for where to successfully put down roots and invest.
But I can't help but think a lot of those immigrants were given a kind of choice: either fly to the New World owing to internal pressures or stay in the home country, organize and fight.
Doesn't that make them flight-takers rather than risk-takers?
And also, what about those South Murkins? Plenty of Euro-DNA infiltrated south of the border too, but they remain a lacklustre economic and underachieving crowd. Too many brown people down there dilute a chromosome or 2 in the stalwart Aryan helix?
Posted by: Gadfly22 | May 14, 2008 2:35 PM
It's always been my suspicion that the Discovery Institute creationists were screaming "Darwin caused the Holocaust!" with more envy than alarm.
Posted by: Kristine | May 14, 2008 2:36 PM
"...the new revelations about American DNA suggest that such ill-starred schemes may go against our very nature."
Where are these new revelations? Isn't the US a melting pot, or supposed to be?
Which 'Americans' is he babbling about? North Americans? Mezo-Americans? South Americans?
Medved is almost as stupid as Pateuse Pantload - almost.
Posted by: Caveat | May 14, 2008 2:41 PM
Oh, people, lay off poor Michael Medved. He's clearly just genetically predisposed to saying stupid things.
Posted by: LightningRose | May 14, 2008 2:42 PM
OK Forodrin I'll bite. Well since the Aussies are all descended from transported criminals or the press ganged soldiers and sailors then they must be wonderful since criminality has been shown to be due to highly risk taking activity. The meek don't steal, they starve instead.
I am comfortable saying the above since NZ was never a penal colony, our settlers were sober folk making investments in the future. Mind you we were historically lucky as colonisation missed the peak of both the Irish potato famine and the hights of the Highland Clearances.
Posted by: Peter Ashby | May 14, 2008 2:44 PM
#79, I don't know about that. Would Medved have gotten on to the same boat my wife did? Was my wife's decision to get on that boat genetic?
I'd say no to both of these questions.
Medved's dumb and racist. Sadly, this isn't exactly news.
Pretty consistent with everything we've heard him say so far, though.
Posted by: MikeM | May 14, 2008 2:45 PM
Years ago I read a book called something like Women's Diaries of the Westward Movement. It was edited by sociologists who had collected and then poured through as many personal diaries and records from women pioneers of the 19the century they could gather. They were looking for commonalities, and comparing them to similar records made by men.
I still remember one thing they pointed out. With perhaps one or two exceptions among dozens of personal accounts, the women traveled West because their husbands made the decision: they did not want to go. Unlike the male diaries, female diaries recounted (or at least mentioned) every child's death along the arduous journey, from their own family or others. They knew what leaving the East meant: the odds that at least some of their children would die along the way was virtually guaranteed. But, given the culture, refusal was seldom a realistic option. If the husband wanted to go, you generally went.
We get DNA from both our fathers AND our mothers. Wives and kids dragged along reluctantly by a head-of-household risk-taker (who could be motivated by all sorts of reasons having nothing to do with his genetic propensities) shouldn't count the same way. I understand that this area has some scientific value, but Medved's version sounds simplistic in the extreme.
Posted by: Sastra | May 14, 2008 2:49 PM
I love the part about "new revelations about American DNA."
Mikey, Mikey, Mikey. Stupid crap that you just made up are not "new revelations."
Posted by: BoxerShorts | May 14, 2008 2:51 PM
Off-topic, but...
There's another thing going on in the news that I find reeks of (Chinese) nationalism... The Chinese are rejecting assistance from the Japanese, South Koreans and Australians because they can't work out transportation issues:
http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=766356
I just find this to be so disturbing. They've never heard of helicopters? Time is running out on 40,000 people, and they can't figure out how to transport 100 people. I don't get it. I'm not saying these 100 or so people would save 40,000 lives, but they MIGHT save some of them. I think they're blowing it.
They turned away the Japanese team at the airport. The Japanese are really good at earthquake rescue.
Americans aren't the only people who make stupid decisions. Unfortunately, I think this decision may be somewhat race-based, too.
Posted by: MikeM | May 14, 2008