Ethnic differences in morality
Everyone & their mother is emailing me about Jonathan Haidt’s new commentary in Edge, FASTER EVOLUTION MEANS MORE ETHNIC DIFFERENCES:
I believe that the “Bell Curve” wars of the 1990s, over race differences in intelligence, will seem genteel and short-lived compared to the coming arguments over ethnic differences in moralized traits. I predict that this “war” will break out between 2012 and 2017.There are reasons to hope that we’ll ultimately reach a consensus that does not aid and abet racism. I expect that dozens or hundreds of ethnic differences will be found, so that any group – like any person -Â can be said to have many strengths and a few weaknesses, all of which are context-dependent. Furthermore, these cross-group differences are likely to be small when compared to the enormous variation within ethnic groups and the enormous and obvious effects of cultural learning. But whatever consensus we ultimately reach, the ways in which we now think about genes, groups, evolution and ethnicity will be radically changed by the unstoppable progress of the human genome project.
Yes, psychopathy might have adaptive “strengths” in a frequency dependent context, but I don’t think that’s what Haidt meant! One difference with the IQ wars when it comes to personality is that it seems every single dopamine receptor has already been implicated in behavior genetic variation, while we’re still a long way from IQ loci results which have been reproduced, though one might double-check on the details of the statistical analyses on suggestive findings from behavior genetics. In any case, since the heritability of behavior in economic games has already been established, it would be interesting if GWAs found some loci which tracked the variation. My own hunch is that personality variation is less continuous than IQ (characterized by a few morphs hanging around fitness peaks), with an underlying architecture of larger effect QTLs. Perhaps altruism is just way simpler to modulate than general intelligence?
Labels: human biodiversity
The serotonin transporter promoter length polymorphism (5HTTLPR) short (s) allele, especially when homozygotic (ss), has been repeatedly implicated in neurotic personality traits and internalizing problems (depression, anxiety, substance abuse) in response to trauma & stress i.e. it makes you “sensitive”.
Or to put it another way, you might say that the long (l) allele makes you cold & unfeeling.
The effect sizes are dramatic in some studies, although much smaller in others, and there are a couple of skeptics who think the whole association is bunk and cry publication bias, but this is the most studied and most replicated finding in behavioural genetics at the moment.
Fun fact : The s allele is much more common in Koreans than it is in Caucasians (80% vs. 40% allele prevalence if I recall). It’s less common in Africans.
Speculate away about what this says about ethnic group differences and “national character”…
Not trying to be funny or facetious (I’m a student of human behavior), but could someone answer my question.
Is Haidt saying that as scientist uncover details of the human genome, they will soon discover that certain kinds of behaviors/personalities found in specific races/ethnic groups will be attributed to the genetic traits of that group? In other words is he saying that some racial/ethnic sterotypes have genetic validity?
How possible is it that the new regime could disrupt funding into this kind of research? While this research could open a lot of possibilities for medical advancement, the left faces a trade off in which their very doctrine would be in question.
This research will advance while identity politics in America intensifies as well. This will most likely lead to losses in free speech (as seen in Europe and Canada), as the establishment tries to keep stability in the country.
Many in the press asked ?if America was ready for a black President?? I think a greater test in racial maturity and progress for America will be its reaction to this kind research?
Will Nina Totenberg and Chris Mathews report on student intolerance on campuses in reaction to the ?inconvenient truths? from this research? Will Saturday Night Live mock the African American lady (at a 2012 campaign event) who fears ?Nazi research? the same way they mocked the lady at the McCain rally who feared that Obama ?is an Arab??
They just found a modifier allele further into the gene — the short/long alleles are in the promoter region, but there’s a SNP further inward. The new variant dials *down* neuroticism, restraining the huge effect that the s allele has.
As for phenotype, search this blog for global personality. I put up a post awhile ago that shows a 2-D graph showing each pop’s score on extraversion and neuroticism.
Here’s the cite:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18486105
SNP in question is rs140700. Allele A lowers depression — it is the derived allele. It’s at much lower frequencies than the s allele in the promoter region — but rank order across pops is the same. (See NCBI’s SNP database.)
Thanks. I knew about that, but it makes the short = sensitive, long = cold story less neat & tidy so I didn’t mention it…
A lot of people in the field are re-analyzing their DNA samples to test for that SNP now.
There’s also a rare, functional SNP, I425V, in the same gene, which has been linked to severe OCD in one pedigree (but not in another sample). PubMed “I425V” for more…
Will Nina Totenberg and Chris Mathews report on student intolerance on campuses in reaction to the ?inconvenient truths? from this research? Will Saturday Night Live mock the African American lady (at a 2012 campaign event) who fears ?Nazi research? the same way they mocked the lady at the McCain rally who feared that Obama ?is an Arab??
Thats just not a fair question to ask. You are asking for the impossible and then laying the blame on the other party for not accepting your position. You are asking the extreme left to adopt behaviors of the extreme right, so why can’t they ask the other way round?
But this is based on the premise that you want to go forward rather than use these positions to rally the masses and keep things polarized.
Yroger: Free speech is alive and well in Europe, thanks, in the UK, anyway. Many of my collegues (scientists) were surprised when they found out that in the US it’s incendiary to claim that there are racial differencess in genetic loading for IQ. They didn’t see what anyone could object to in a difference of a few IQ points. Not everyone here is that naive / intellectually tolerant, but in general race is less of an issue here.
As for Canada – no-one’s kicked J P Rushton’s out of the University of Western Ontario yet…
Fueling the fire:
http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Rs324650 rs324650 is reproducibly linked to IQ and is far more common in asian populations and is one of at least http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere/Intelligence 6 SNPs linked to intelligence
http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Rs4680 rs4680 (A;A) boosts working memory and cognitive function compared to (G;G) but it also hampers emotional control.
http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/DRD2 DRD2 and http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/DRD4 DRD4 such as http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Rs1800955 rs1800955 appear to influence sexual curiosity.
and as mentioned http://www.snpedia.com/index.php/5-HTTLPR 5-HTTLPR has many interesting effects, including the efficacy of placebo.
Thanks -
Although the “efficacy of placebo” study was a bit rubbish actually, indeed it’s a good case study in what can go wrong with genetic association studies as I wrote at the time