Friday, November 30, 2007

More "race is stupid" notes...

My high school is number one in the US News and World Report index...not surprising at all. The surprising part to me is that the minority student enrollment percentage is reported as 4.5%. Hmmm...what do they mean by minority? Only "black and Hispanic". What about the other minorities (Native American, Romany, Blondes)? Minority is now a euphemism for only some minorities that...what? If you think about it, this label is making the truly racist assumption that "blacks and Hispanics" need to be tracked separately from other people. Why would that be?

I think people assume that because the average scores for some defined group of people are lower, there needs to some separate tracking of that group... This enables the racist assumption- that any one individual is going to be more like the median member of some group they belong to, than the median of the population as a whole. For example, since the median test scores of students in the US that have Chinese ancestry score are higher than the median for the population as a whole, one might falsely presume that any random Chines person is smarter than average. Of course, this would be wrong. The converse applies to groups whose median test scores fall below the median.

In any case, schools should stop reporting their "racial percentages". It doesn't really help anyone but racists who are looking to avoid specific races. We're all miscellaneous now.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Book idea from search hit...


Someone out there is looking for nice introductory philosophy book, instead they found this stupid blog. ...and I'm still addicted to Google Analytics.

Saturday, November 17, 2007

Ronald Reagan, "Limited Mental Capacity"

What's up with Republicans not liking people that are smart? You have to admit they have become the anti-intellectual party...Bush Sr. not included (although you have to wonder why everyone kept calling the former head of the CIA a wimp).

Recent transcript excerpt:
President Nixon: What's your evaluation or Reagan after meeting him several times now.

Kissinger: Well, I think he's a--actually I think he's a pretty decent guy.

President Nixon: Oh, decent, no question, but his brains

Kissinger: Well, his brains, are negligible. I--

President Nixon: He's really pretty shallow, Henry.

Kissinger: He's shallow. He’s got no...he's an actor. He--When he gets a line he does it very well. He said, "Hell, people are remembered not for what they do, but for what they say. Can't you find a few good lines?" [Chuckles.] That's really an actor's approach to foreign policy--to substantive....


President Nixon: Back to Reagan though. It shows you how a man of limited mental capacity simply doesn't know what the Christ is going on in the foreign area.


Don't think too much!

Thursday, November 01, 2007

Tom Peters is with me!


Stop saying "Asian" campaign hits the international management consultant level:
Tom says: "Implication: Eliminate the use of terms such as 'Asia'—as in 'the Asian management style.' Eliminate: as in zero, none, never, naught, zip."

Now how long before we can get the ban extended to any "racist classification"?
How long before multiracial is everyone?