From: b.scott@csuohio.edu   
      
   On Mon, 1 Dec 2008 10:40:31 -0600, Suzanne Blom   
    wrote in   
    in   
   rec.arts.sf.misc:   
      
   > "David Friedman"  wrote in message   
   > news:ddfr-27759C.23371130112008@newsfarm.ams.highwinds-media.com...   
      
   >> In article ,   
   >> Aqua  wrote:   
      
   >>> I'm not claiming sex and "race"[2] differences don't exist, I'm claiming   
   >>> the kind of differences the people who are so obsessed about sex and   
   >>> "race" are particularly obsessed about, don't have much actual evidence.   
      
   >> I note that this post, like your others, shows no sign that you   
   >> understand the particular difference I was suggesting, or the reason why   
   >> I thought it would be selected for. Let alone offering any reason to   
   >> think I am mistaken.   
      
   [...]   
      
   > So far, you have given only one argument for your position.  It's boring.   
      
   Boring would be irrelevant if the argument were strong   
   enough, but in this case it obviously isn't.  Aqua couldn't   
   even believe at first that anyone would seriously offer it.   
   David, of course, interprets this as failure to understand   
   it; apparently he finds it more plausible that a   
   professional with a bent for mathematics failed to   
   understand a trivial statistical observation than that he's   
   overlooked something significant.  This is unlikely on its   
   face to those of us who don't share his unbounded faith in   
   his intellectual superiority.  Moreover, the fact that he   
   didn't understand Aqua's comments in the TLIQ subthread[*]   
   does nothing to increase its plausibility.   
      
   [*] Had he done so, he'd have realized that his example does   
   not in fact provide a possible scenario in which   
   'researchers [are] going to observe more female chimps   
   actually doing their thing with tools, learning and   
   innovation': if the female chimps in his example really are   
   'doing their thing with tools, learning and innovation', the   
   scenario isn't possible.  (I suspect that even this rather   
   broad hint isn't enough to jar the flaw in his example out   
   of his intellectual blind spot, but that's his problem, not   
   mine.)   
      
   Brian   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)