The Unz Review

Razib Khan • February 5, 2013 • 39 Comments

Note: An update on this post. I want to be clear that I think Jared Diamond is wrong on a lot of details, and many cultural anthropologists are rightly calling him out on that. But, they do a disservice to their message by politicizing their critique, and ascribing malevolence to all those who disagree with...

mrmandias says:

February 7, 2013 at 3:54 am GMT

@Anonymous

@Anonymous

"Show me evidence which demonstrates anything *other* than significantly higher rates of violence among those in tribal societies as compared with state societies".

How about 41,000,000 people killed during the 20th century as a result of wars between or within states? (see: http://www.cissm.umd.edu/papers/files/deathswarsconflictsjune52006.pdf)

Replies: @mrmandias, @Anonymous

What does ‘rates’ mean to you?

On Jonah Lehrer

Razib Khan • August 7, 2012 • 23 Comments

Since Jonah Lehrer came up in the open thread last week, I'm going to mention it. First, I'll preface this by saying that my interactions with Jonah, who I labeled the "boy king of cognitive neuroscience" jokingly at one point, were all positive. Since Jonah quoted me in The Wall Street Journal I received an...

mrmandias says:

August 8, 2012 at 3:34 pm GMT • 100 Words

“Hmm, perhaps one reason this blog is somewhat trustable (in that I believe you won’t fake things) is you aren’t nice and have no pedigree ”

The main reason is that the author is willing to air that he was duped. Of course, the author is smart enough to know that being willing to air it increases his credibility. But (1) being smart and (2) caring that people perceive you as credible, are both credibility enhancers anyway.

Open Thread 8/8/2012

Razib Khan • August 8, 2012 • 23 Comments

The nature of the restrictions of the comments are relatively free-form on this post. You should maintain some decorum as usual. But you can post links, ask me or other readers questions, etc.

mrmandias says:

August 8, 2012 at 3:31 pm GMT

What’s your take on the idea that East Asian populations show more neoteny and this might be related to their elevated levels of conscientiousness and shame and etc.

We Are All Anglo-Saxons Now

Razib Khan • July 27, 2012 • 44 Comments

I'm kind of wary of getting into political debates at this point because it's not my primary interest (additionally, people with stronger political views often end up willfully misrepresenting me because they think I'm taking specific sides, even if they actually guess my preferences incorrectly!). But the whole Mitt Romney-Anglo-Saxon heritage kerfuffle has now gotten...

mrmandias says:

July 30, 2012 at 7:21 pm GMT

#22,
how we go about evaluating the ‘englishness’ of a religion I don’t know. But–and I don’t mean this pejoratively, because I’m a believing Mormon–Mormonism clearly arose out of the radical English protestant tradition. In some ways, Mormonism looks like an elaborated British Israelitism.

Comments on Internet Publications, What to Do?

Razib Khan • July 23, 2012 • 8 Comments

This is probably relevant if you have a blog or run a webzine of some sort. It'll be much more abstract if you are a commenter, and can't relate concretely to weirdo creeps who persistently spam your comments and contact you via email. In relation to bloggingheads.tv my own two primary complaints from my experience...

mrmandias says: • Website

July 24, 2012 at 10:52 pm GMT

Puckishly, I will point out that occasional posts about how you severely eliminate the worthless herd commenters and leave only the superior few is also a good strategy for getting your commenters to commit to your blog.