Corpania Ideas

CAVEAT! I'm an amateur philosopher and idea-generator. I am NOT an investment professional. Don't take any of my advice before consulting with an attorney and also a duly licensed authority on finance. Seriously, this my personal blog of random ideas only for entertainment purposes. Don't be an idiot.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Defining "Good" via Descendants' Prosperity / Evolutionary Psychology Explains Racism

I'm not seriously claiming that the following "Evolutionary Psychology Theory of Racism" is original (or necessarily true). But it has been rattling around my brain lately so I thought I'd finally share it. Here is "my" idea:

1) Nearly entirely independent of a "pure meritocracy", I think most people fundamentally define "good" as that which enables their descendants to survive & prosper.

2) Consequently, people are constantly try to "rig the game" to favor their descendants. If you're smart you want to create/reinforce a society that rewards intelligence. If you're beautiful, you place value on that and de facto "punish" those you deem unattractive. Same dynamic with athletic ability, humor/charm, religion, legacy status advantage at an alma mater (or "blue blood"/genetic appreciation in general), and nearly all other tribal Balkanizations.  It's also why bellacose people want to resolve disputes with war/fighting and fear/avoid any tactic or path where they don't have an advantage.

3) Racists, at least subconsciously, know they themselves are actually inferior to the general population and thus don't want a meritocracy because it would hurt them and their descendants. Here's why:
         a. - Racism is the negative prejudice/discrimination that is invalided by science/truth/facts. Only for the sake of this semantic  argument, "a prejudiced comment validated by science/truth/facts would not be racist - e.g. expecting the Bambenga Pygmie you're about to meet will be short is not racist". Consequently racism must be inherently contrary to a pure meritocracy.
        b. - If you rationally assume racism exists at least somewhat then that proves that we don't have a "pure meritocracy". Even if you irrationally believe races have significant differences in potential (like those who still accept the dubious conclusions in Hernstein & Murray's "The Bell Curve") surely you still recognize that a higher percentage of affluent children reach a higher proportion of their potential, due to their advantages, than do disadvantaged children (exceptions notwithstanding).
        c. - In a meritocracy advantages are only granted to those who achieve in order to maximize their achievements (you can't truly know if someone can hit a 90 mph fastball if you only let him experience 70 mph pitches).
       d. - Consequently, rich racists have the most to lose in switching to a meritocracy. They would lose their advantages and thus necessarily diminish their levels of potential achievement. This is compounded by the likelihood that a previously disadvantaged person could now achieve more which, while potentially net increasing the country's wealth macroeconomically, would result in a relative decrease in those rich racists' success.

4) Consequently, seeing someone spout racist comments should signify to you his/her ignorance and frustration with losing the "rigged rules" that unduly benefited him/her which were contrary to a pure meritocracy.

p.s. What would be a "pure meritocracy" and whether such a system would be desirable to humanity as a whole are very separate and worthy questions.

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