Selective Breeding for Docility?

Off Topic
1

A quote from Cosmo Shalizi’s blog at Those Voices Again

“If IQ really correlates with the ability to flourish in an industrial society (and I’m quite prepared to believe that), then it is, as I said last time, a measurement of the ability to navigate paper-pushing bureaucracies �?? to learn to manipulate arbitrary abstract explicit rules, and to do so on command. Presuming that people who don’t manage to pull off at least some minimum level of this make very unattractive mating partners, and so have below-average reproductive success, then those of us in developed countries have spent the last one or two centuries breeding for docility, in both senses of the word.”

Now… he’s certainly not making this as a serious statement backed up by research, it’s part of his larger war against some ideas about human intelligence, but taken by itself the idea that bureaucracy is partly to blame for the emasculation of the developed (and I’d also add the communist) world, and that the emasculation is growing in our gene pool with every generation… it’s scary and interesting.

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WTF? I don’t think that makes any sense at all. It’s a crock of shit.

IQ does not correlate with docility, emasculation or breeding success. Do you think humans have ever reproduced with each other based on intelligence? A hot body and winning smile goes more of the way towards getting laid, than a conversation about rules & procedures, or technical speak. Do nerds make more attractive mating partners than athletic types who may not have such a high IQ? I don’t think so.

Furthermore, those who do not meet the ‘minimum’ IQ tend to be more docile and less aware. This is also WHY their IQ is lower.

Those with an IQ level that meets the ‘minimum’, or even higher, are not necessarily docile, nor do they make good blind followers or paper-pushers. In fact, those with higher IQ are more to be able to see through the bullshit in a beauracracy, and become the ones to do something about it.

3

I should have cut out the IQ part, it’s not the interesting part. The author was just using this idea as a way to attack the use of IQ. Taking IQ out and distilling the idea gives us:

Money improves your likelihood of breeding success. Not having an ability to navigate bureaucracies and put up with their stupid crap at a certain minimum “competent” level greatly limits your ability to make money. That much is true.

If the ability to put up with stupid crap is partly genetic (as the author assumes) then this would mean each generation is more willing to put up with stupid crap than the previous, or to put it politely -more docile.

Does that make more sense?

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Perhaps things are different in Poland, but in the U.S., educated people delay reproduction and have far fewer children than uneducated people. So the better you are at paper pushing and making paper, the fewer children you will have. IQ is largely a function of education and social opportunity. Your quote is social darwinist nonsense, but assuming environment plays no role and IQ is strictly inherited from genetics, dummies are winning the breeding race, not the beaurocrats.

My bottom line is this: success in our society is not positively associated with reproduction. If anything, your argument should be flipped 180 degrees.

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I don’t really believe in the theory that IQ is a static measure of intelligence anyway. Intelligence is a dynamic thing, IQ can be raised by training the brain, and there are many different types of intelligence, not just one overall measuring stick.

Ok, if you take IQ out of the picture:

Money would only increase your chance of breeding success if you lived in a society where women strongly select of prefer mates based on their monetary status.

It does happen to some extent - sure, women prefer a financially secure mate. I think it happens more so in the USA and perhaps Europe, but in my experience in Australia, people are more down-to-earth and tend to select more based on character/looks/personality/confidence/sense of humor etc. I know friends who have average intelligence and IQ, but are not suited to paper-pushing or navigating beauracracies, yet they can still score plenty of ass. The idea of choosing someone for their money is frowned upon here because it’s seen as leeching. If you want money, you go and make your own, you don’t go looking for someone with cash so you can leech off them.

Furthermore, the new millionaire class in Australia are the working class tradesmen such as plumbers, builders, and so forth. A survey found that women prefer the more outdoorsman/tradesman/workman type than the paper-pushing bearacrats. The “tradies”,as they are called here, are seen as rugged, fit individuals who are stronger and more sexy than the office workers, who are perceived as rigid, pale, physically weaker pencil necks, who don’t know how to loosen up and have fun.

I get what you’re saying and I agree that there are many sheeple out there, but I don’t buy the correlation between money, the ability to put up with stupid crap, and breeding success.

A lot of people here that I know of, who work in bearacracies, know that they are putting up with stupid crap, but they do it not because they are docilely unaware that it is stupid, but because you have to not give a fuck if you want to get paid. It’s the difference between being docile and malleable and being forced into a corner to wear the monkey suit and perform for peanuts, in order to survive. Underneath, they are fuming and dissatisfied, yet you have to hide it and put on the game face in order to make a living.

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[quote]Procyon wrote:
Perhaps things are different in Poland, but in the U.S., educated people delay reproduction and have far fewer children than uneducated people. So the better you are at paper pushing and making paper, the fewer children you will have. IQ is largely a function of education and social opportunity. Your quote is social darwinist nonsense, but assuming environment plays no role and IQ is strictly inherited from genetics, dummies are winning the breeding race, not the beaurocrats.

My bottom line is this: success in our society is not positively associated with reproduction. If anything, your argument should be flipped 180 degrees.[/quote]

Exactly.

7

[quote]JohnnyBlaze wrote:

A lot of people here that I know of, who work in bearacracies, know that they are putting up with stupid crap, but they do it not because they are docilely unaware that it is stupid, but because you have to not give a fuck if you want to get paid. It’s the difference between being docile and malleable and being forced into a corner to wear the monkey suit and perform for peanuts, in order to survive. Underneath, they are fuming and dissatisfied, yet you have to hide it and put on the game face in order to make a living.[/quote]

Completely agree. Almost everyone has to put up with a fair amount of bullshit in this day and age. IMO, it’s the stagnation that leads to docility, the compromise of accepting the bullshit for the sake of routine.

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Good post. I don’t have anything significant to contribute but I think I fall somewhere in between.

I agree with JohnnyBlaze on this one. Human survival is a brutish expedition. Human evolution on the other hand…

That being said, physical means will always play a part in human cultural development as a driving force, nothing more, nothing less.

I don’t think it’s scary. It’s like carrying a gun, you should have a good head on your shoulders if you carry a gun. That’s a gross analogy but.

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His arguments are full of personal subjectivities and irrational conclusions. Most of what he claims can be nihilated with something as simple as reductio ad absurdum.

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Personally I hope Shalizi is wrong and that the pussification of society is in something shallower and less permanent than our genes.

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[quote]DSmolken wrote:
Personally I hope Shalizi is wrong and that the pussification of society is in something shallower and less permanent than our genes.[/quote]

Even if he wasn’t, I see a simple solution: Everyone here make it a personal mission to sleep with as many women as possible and you could sort of see at as doing a good deed for humanity.

12

[quote]JohnnyBlaze wrote:
WTF? I don’t think that makes any sense at all. It’s a crock of shit.

IQ does not correlate with docility, emasculation or breeding success. Do you think humans have ever reproduced with each other based on intelligence? A hot body and winning smile goes more of the way towards getting laid, than a conversation about rules & procedures, or technical speak. Do nerds make more attractive mating partners than athletic types who may not have such a high IQ? I don’t think so.

Furthermore, those who do not meet the ‘minimum’ IQ tend to be more docile and less aware. This is also WHY their IQ is lower.

Those with an IQ level that meets the ‘minimum’, or even higher, are not necessarily docile, nor do they make good blind followers or paper-pushers. In fact, those with higher IQ are more to be able to see through the bullshit in a beauracracy, and become the ones to do something about it. [/quote]

I would agree. Geniuses typically spend their time in academia because it is where they excel and what they inherantly enjoy. Most people in academia do spend more time in books than they do in a gym and consequently have the pencil neck association.

I think the original article is disregarding causation vs. correlation to make a bunk point.

An ideal balance should be a stong mind and body in my opinion. Many philosophers over the ages have agreed, including John Locke in one of my favorite cheesy quotes:

“A sound mind in a sound body is a short but full description of a happy state in this world.”
John Locke
English empiricist philosopher (1632 - 1704)