[TODO: Sasha disaster, breakup with Vassar group, this was really bad for me]
-On 13 February 2021, ["Silicon Valley's Safe Space"](https://archive.ph/zW6oX), the _New York Times_ piece on _Slate Star Codex_ came out. It was ... pretty lame? (In contrast to a vicious hit piece that one might concede was competently done for all of its mendacity.) Metz did a mediocre job of explaining what our robot cult is about, while [pushing hard on the subtext](https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=5310) to make us look racist and sexist, occasionally resorting to odd constructions that are surpising to read from someone who has been a professional writer for decades. ("It was nominally a blog", Metz wrote of _Slate Star Codex_. ["Nominally"](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nominally)?) The article's claim that Alexander "wrote in a wordy, often roundabout way that left many wondering what he really believed" seemed to me more like a critique of the "many"'s reading comprehension, rather than Alexander's writing.
+On 13 February 2021, ["Silicon Valley's Safe Space"](https://archive.ph/zW6oX), the _New York Times_ piece on _Slate Star Codex_ came out. It was ... pretty lame? (_Just_ lame, not a masterfully vicious hit piece.) Metz did a mediocre job of explaining what our robot cult is about, while [pushing hard on the subtext](https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=5310) to make us look racist and sexist, occasionally resorting to odd constructions that are surprising to read from someone who has been a professional writer for decades. ("It was nominally a blog", Metz wrote of _Slate Star Codex_. ["Nominally"](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nominally)?) The article's claim that Alexander "wrote in a wordy, often roundabout way that left many wondering what he really believed" seemed to me more like a critique of the "many"'s reading comprehension, rather than Alexander's writing.
-Although the public's poor reading comprehension may have served a protective function for Scott. A mob that can only attack you over things that look bad when quoted out of context, can't attack you over the meaning of "wordy, often roundabout" text that the mob can't read. The _Times_ article included this sleazy guilt-by-association attempt:
+Although the many's poor reading comprehension may have served a protective function for Scott. A mob that can only attack you over things that look bad when quoted out of context, can't attack you over the meaning of "wordy, often roundabout" text that the mob can't read. The _Times_ article included this sleazy guilt-by-association attempt:
-> In one post, he [aligned himself with Charles Murray](https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/05/23/three-great-articles-on-poverty-and-why-i-disagree-with-all-of-them/), who proposed a link between race and I.Q. in "The Bell Curve." In another, he pointed out that Mr. Murray believes Black people "are genetically less intelligent than white people."
+> In one post, [Alexander] [aligned himself with Charles Murray](https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/05/23/three-great-articles-on-poverty-and-why-i-disagree-with-all-of-them/), who proposed a link between race and I.Q. in "The Bell Curve." In another, he pointed out that Mr. Murray believes Black people "are genetically less intelligent than white people."[^sloppy]
-(Weirdly sloppy of the _Times_ to link the first post, but not [the second](https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/)?)
+[^sloppy]: It was oddly sloppy of the _Times_ to link the first post, ["Three Great Articles On Poverty, And Why I Disagree With All Of Them"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/05/23/three-great-articles-on-poverty-and-why-i-disagree-with-all-of-them/), but not the second, ["Against Murderism"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/)—especially since "Against Murderism" is specifically about Alexander's reasons for being skeptical of "racism" as an explanatory concept, and therefore contains "objectively" more compelling sentences to quote out of context than a passing reference to Charles Murray. Apparently, the _Times_ couldn't even be bothered to smear Scott with misinterpretations of his actual ideas, if guilt-by-association did the trick with less effort on behalf of both journalist and reader.
-[Alexander's reply statement](https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/statement-on-new-york-times-article) points out the _Times_'s obvious chicanery: "align[ing] himself with Murray" in an article
-seems like a weirdly brazen type of falsehood for a major newspaper.
+But the sense in which Alexander "aligned himself with Murray" in ["Three Great Articles On Poverty, And Why I Disagree With All Of Them"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/05/23/three-great-articles-on-poverty-and-why-i-disagree-with-all-of-them/) in the context of a simplified taxonomy of views on alleviate poverty, doesn't imply agreement with Murray's views on heredity. (It being difficult to lift people up from poverty is difficult doesn't mean poverty is "genetic": a couple years earlier, Alexander wrote that ["Society Is Fixed, Biology Is Mutable"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/10/society-is-fixed-biology-is-mutable/).)
+
+[Alexander's reply statement](https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/statement-on-new-york-times-article) pointed out the _Times_'s obvious chicanery, but (I claim) introduced a distortion of its own—
+
+> The Times points out that I agreed with Murray that poverty was bad, and that also at some other point in my life noted that Murray had offensive views on race, and heavily implies this means I agree with Murray's offensive views on race. This seems like a weirdly brazen type of falsehood for a major newspaper.
+
+It _is_ a weirdly brazen invalid _inference_. But by calling it a "falsehood", Alexander heavily implies this means he disagrees with Murray's offensive views on race: in invalidating the _Times_'s charge of guilt-by-association with Murray, Alexander validates Murray's guilt.
+
+But ... anyone who's actually read _and understood_ Scott's work should be able to infer that Scott probably finds genetically-mediated group differences plausible (as a value-free matter of empirical Science with no particular normative implications): his [review of Judith Rich Harris](https://archive.ph/Zy3EL) indicates that he accepts the evidence from twin studies for individual behavioral differences having a large genetic component, and section III. of his ["The Atomic Bomb Considered As Hungarian High School Science Fair Project"](https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/26/the-atomic-bomb-considered-as-hungarian-high-school-science-fair-project/) indicates that he accepts genetics as an explantion for group differences in intelligence (in the case of Ashkenazi Jews).
+
+There are a lot of standard caveats that go here that Scott would no doubt scrupulously address if he ever chose to tackle the subject of genetically-mediated group differences in general: [the mere existence of a group difference in a "heritable" trait doesn't itself imply a genetic cause of the group difference (because the groups' environments could also be different)](/2020/Apr/book-review-human-diversity/#heritability-caveats). It is without a doubt _entirely conceivable_ that the Ashkenazi IQ advantage is real and genetic, but black–white gap is fake and environmental.[^bet] Moreover, group averages are just that—averages. They don't imply anything about individuals and don't justify discrimination against individuals.
+
+[^bet]: It's just—how much do you want to bet on that? How much do you think _Scott_ wants to bet on that?
+
+But ... anyone who's actually read _and understood_ Charles Murray's work, knows that Murray _also_ includes the standard caveats! (Even though the one about group differences not implying anything about individuals is [actually](/2020/Apr/book-review-human-diversity/#individuals-should-not-be-judged-by-the-average) [wrong](/2022/Jun/comment-on-a-scene-from-planecrash-crisis-of-faith/).) The _Times_'s insinuation that Scott Alexander is a racist _like Charles Murray_ seems like a "[Gettier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettier_problem) attack": the charge is essentially correct, even though the evidence used to justify the charge to distracted _New York Times_ readers is completely bogus.
+
+Why do I keep repeatedly bringing this up, that "rationalist" leaders almost certainly believe in cognitive race differences (even if it's hard to get them to publicly admit it in a form that's easy for _New York Times_ readers to decode)?
+
+Because one of the things I noticed while trying to make sense of why my entire social circle suddenly decided in 2016 that guys like me could become women by means of saying so, is that in the conflict between the "rationalist" Caliphate and mainstream progressives, the "rationalists"' defensive strategy is one of deception. The _New York Times_ accuses us of being racists like Charles Murray. Instead of pointing out that being a racist _like Charles Murray_ is the obviously correct position that sensible people will tend to reach by being sensible, we disingenuously deny everything. (Or rather, people are distributed on a spectrum between disingenuously denying everything and sincerly accepting that Charles Murray is Actually Bad, with the older and more skilled among us skewed more towards disingenuous denial.)
+
+It works surprisingly well. I fear my love of Truth is not so great that if I didn't have Something to Protect, I would have happily participated in the cover-up.
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projects / Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git / commitdiff