Jordan Peterson

[Chose]

https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/988974121261256705

Yeah, I guess he really is right-wing.

#3: sounds good, doesn't work. Turns into the infamous Google Memo situation where women are inferior just because I say so, but it's not sexist, it's just a "hierarchy of competence"

That is a dishonest reading of the Google memo. What it actually said was:

Sexism does exist and I love diversity and we should to remove sexism and increase diversity. However, the goal shouldn't be to get exactly 50/50 representation between men and women in tech, because, although sexism does for sure play a role now, even if we entirely eliminated it, there is no reason to think that would result in 50/50 representation. And then he goes on about average biological trait differences between men and women as well as their average differences in interests.

With respect to competence, both the Google Memo and JP say that women are probably equally competent in math and science on average compared to men.

Whatever the case may be, I'm curious to what exactly is wrong with the logic of opposing a 50/50 goal. I assume what I am going to hear is that opposing "equality of outcome" is somehow an excuse that ring-wingers use so they can do nothing. The problem with that argument is that it is a terrible argument. It simply doesn't follow that opposing equality of outcomes means we should do nothing. I think we can do a lot, and should do a lot. That doesn't mean that 50/50 should be the goal. I think that is a terrible goal. The goal is that everyone should be as free as possible to do whatever they want and there shouldn't be any barriers, societal or otherwise, in the way with regard to your gender or race or anything else.

 

[Bootstoots]

I dunno man, implying that there is some shining line between William Buckley and David Duke, those 12 principles for conservatism...I feel like he is either totally incompetent and doing the opposite of what he means to do (assuming it is this for the sake of argument), or he is actually using dogwhistles to incite these people to further extremism while appearing reasonable to people who are less tuned-in to fascist appeals.

The differences between Buckley and Duke are pretty large, and the former is occasionally worth listening to. I'd place him a bit to the left of Buckley, FWIW.

I've spent some time reading and listening to far-right/fascist stuff, ranging from New World Order conspiracists like Alex Jones to the "race realism" of Jared Taylor and friends with their emphasis on 21st century scientific racism. I go to Stormfront every so often as well, and read stuff for as long as I can make myself. I think I would pick up on dogwhistles if he were trying to conceal a far-right agenda, and I haven't heard any from him. He seems to say more or less exactly what he thinks with no obfuscation that I have detected.

As far as I can tell, the "alt right" is mostly made up of lonely, angry young men who don't see any real purpose to their lives, who think that liberals, women, minorities, etc. are somehow to blame. If that's the case, it's not surprising that Peterson's message would be like catnip to them. I suspect they initially get drawn to him because of Peterson's role in the latest social controversies, but end up staying because he says things that appeal to young men who haven't gotten their lives in order - not because they're detecting far right sympathies.

yeah, you know, unless you're trans

With the pronoun thing, his real opposition seems to be to the use of pronouns other than he or she (ze, xir, singular they to refer to a specific individual, etc). I don't believe he would insist on misgendering a biological male who identifies as a woman or vice versa - although it does say something that I'm not totally sure.

 

[Lexicus]

The differences between Buckley and Duke are pretty large,

One is genteel, one is not. That's about the only difference worth mentioning.

I think we can do a lot, and should do a lot.

What should we do?

 

[aelf]

As far as I can tell, the "alt right" is mostly made up of lonely, angry young men who don't see any real purpose to their lives, who think that liberals, women, minorities, etc. are somehow to blame. If that's the case, it's not surprising that Peterson's message would be like catnip to them. I suspect they initially get drawn to him because of Peterson's role in the latest social controversies, but end up staying because he says things that appeal to young men who haven't gotten their lives in order - not because they're detecting far right sympathies.

The thing is, will they take what he says and use them to get their lives "in order", or will they use what he says to justify their alt-right views?

 

[Lexicus]

"Getting their lives in order" is hardly mutually incompatible with "engaging in far-right activism."

 

[Bootstoots]

One is genteel, one is not. That's about the only difference worth mentioning.

Depends on what you think is worth mentioning, I guess. Certainly Buckley held many repugnant views - some of which he changed, others he didn't. But it's a stretch to say that his views were basically white nationalism without the sheets. If they were, he'd not have acted to eject anti-Semites and John Birchers from respectable conservatism, changed his views on segregation in the 1960s and vocally opposed Wallace in 1968, joined Amnesty International and stayed with it for a decade, and so on.

The thing is, will they take what he says and use them to get their lives "in order", or will they use what he says to justify their alt-right views?

Granted, I'm sure many will use what he says to justify their own beliefs, e.g. stretching Peterson's views on average gender differences in interest and personalities to justify a belief that men are inherently superior or something. Peterson is quite strongly anti-authoritarian, though, and I don't think there's much in what he says that could sustain the far right as a movement.

 

[Lexicus]

Peterson is quite strongly anti-authoritarian, though, and I don't think there's much in what he says that could sustain the far right as a movement.

Anti-authoritarians don't argue that hierarchies are natural or desirable tho

 

[Harv]

40 pages and I finally find this thread and start going through it. My general comment is JP is an interesting character and I seem to be learning quite a bit from some of his videos and interviews.

saw one of his videos when he talked a bit about iq tests in the american army, then saw - again in the list of vids to the right - a video titled (the one i posted here) thus that it would be about him possibly saying what his iq is.
Now, after watching the previous vid to this one (US army etc), i noticed he doesn't sound intelligent. Eg he seems to struggle a bit, be toned-down but not in a way which would seem to be caused by massive amount of thinking on his mind, so checked the vid where he would say what his iq is, expecting that if he did come to say a number it would be something like 120.
Fat chance. He claims his iq is "in excess of 150".

He puts a lot of stock in IQ. He says IQ has a high correlation with life success, along with the Big-Five personality trait Conscientiousness. I do not know what he claims his IQ to be, or how many times he had it tested, but I take it at face value.

As well as I understand IQ, it is a test result measuring how well you did on that particular IQ test. At one time, I thought it was a number that gets stamped on your head and you are stuck with for life, but I no longer believe that is the case.

I understand this number can change if you take it again. I have also heard that it can vary with the subject's level of motivation to score well on the test.

Something that really threw my faith in IQ as an absolute measure is the Flynn Effect and the variation of average IQ in different countries. The Flynn Effect is where each generation does better on IQ tests than the previous generation, at a rate of about 3 points per decade, and the test has to be scaled. So if you take a test from the 1940's and give it to a group of kids in 2018, the average is 120. If you take the current test and give it to the kids from the 1940's, you are getting an average of 80. Some of these kids moved on to design all the infrastructure we take for granted today.

So if you look at a list of IQ by country and see a country with an average IQ of 80, I wonder if it is because they are.... slow- or if their mindset is somewhere in the 1940's. This is kind of what shook my faith in IQ tests.

So if you want to score huge on an IQ test, take a very early version! Have fun!

I suppose there are tests on the internet that do the same thing.

This is all news to me and I am still exploring this question. I never did have IQ formally tested. I have an engineering degree and a master's degree and that is pretty much all I have to go with, myself. I suppose at this point in life, IQ is a moot point. Given that I am doing well in general, I would guess that it is somewhere in the "sweet spot."

Online on another forum, I know of one guy who says his IQ is 175, which I take at face value, but he says it does him a fat bit of good. I think right now he is a truck driver.

That's 3.5 standard deviations or an IQ level shared by 3 million people worldwide. Given our global winner take all media environment, it is entirely reasonable a person who used their IQ to figure out how to reach the masses would be a) the person you watched and b) a high IQ person, or one of those 3 million people.

So, 17000 or so in Canada will have this IQ level. Also, long time, no see!

Hating Jordan Peterson is an agenda point of at least an ideology group or two and I'm still trying to sort out why.

The same applies to loving JP. He does have a cult following, doesn't he?

Also, long time!
---------------------------------------------------------------

Ironically, from him I learned from one of his more famous interviews is that the gender pay gap really is a real thing.

I was going to list other things I learned, but I think that's it for now.

Maybe I can go through more pages later.

 

[metalhead]

I agree with him in general on free speech and that college students should not attempt to no-platform people who disagree with them (although I'd throw in an exception for real neo-Nazis/white nationalists like Richard Spencer or David Duke).

College students agree with this too. They mostly just no-platform unabashed racists. The problem, as @Lexicus nearly points out here:

I dunno man, implying that there is some shining line between William Buckley and David Duke, those 12 principles for conservatism...I feel like he is either totally incompetent and doing the opposite of what he means to do (assuming it is this for the sake of argument), or he is actually using dogwhistles to incite these people to further extremism while appearing reasonable to people who are less tuned-in to fascist appeals.

is that modern American conservatism as an ideology was founded on white supremacy. The "progress" Buckley so explicitly described conservatives opposing was racial equality, social acceptance and tolerance of interracial marriage, etc.

He was an avowed white supremacist, and favored violent separation of the races as he wrote in the National Review. The fact that he retconned white supremacy to fit into a more palatable and not-explicitly-racist political ideology is remarkable, but certainly should not be celebrated.

 

[Lexicus]

is that modern American conservatism as an ideology was founded on white supremacy. The "progress" Buckley so explicitly described conservatives opposing was racial equality, social acceptance and tolerance of interracial marriage, etc.

Ultimately this is indeed exactly what I was getting at. In some ways, calling modern American conservatism an "ideology" is to jump it up above its true station.

 

[Mouthwash]

Anti-authoritarians don't argue that hierarchies are natural or desirable tho

Authoritarianism refers to one's attitude towards the state. It would be reasonable to characterize a society of slaveholding households as anti-authoritarian.

is that modern American conservatism as an ideology was founded on white supremacy.

Christianity was founded as an apocalyptic, sectarian cult that viewed its leader as God.

https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/988974121261256705

#1 is not even wrong (what are these principles and where did they come from?).

#2 is true.

#3 is true, but way too vague to be debatable.

#4 is true.

#5 I can't make sense of.

#6 is not true.

#7 is true.

#8 is mostly true. For every genuine benefit revolutionaries have given us, I could point to a dozen catastrophes.

#9 is true.

#10 is true, with the caveat that we're talking about individuals and not corporations.

#11 is true.

#12 is half true, since justice isn't just a matter of policy. There has to be some ideal to follow.

All in all, not one of Jordan's better moments, but this isn't even as embarrassing as some stuff I've seen from Nathan J Robinson. Here is the most cogent video I've seen of him arguing for his anti-PC beliefs (you should know what peak Peterson is like before you pass judgment):

inb4 "that video sucks peterson is even more of an idiot resist white supremacy"

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Something that really threw my faith in IQ as an absolute measure is the Flynn Effect and the variation of average IQ in different countries. The Flynn Effect is where each generation does better on IQ tests than the previous generation, at a rate of about 3 points per decade, and the test has to be scaled. So if you take a test from the 1940's and give it to a group of kids in 2018, the average is 120. If you take the current test and give it to the kids from the 1940's, you are getting an average of 80. Some of these kids moved on to design all the infrastructure we take for granted today.

I don't know that this is a particularly surprising outcome. Cognitive ability does require some contextual knowledge of the questions asked still. Also, in addition to motivation score can change based on the individual's condition (rest/sickness/medical conditions). No tool is perfect, but this one still has pretty good predictive value.

So if you look at a list of IQ by country and see a country with an average IQ of 80, I wonder if it is because they are.... slow- or if their mindset is somewhere in the 1940's. This is kind of what shook my faith in IQ tests.

Should it? Broadly speaking, are countries with lower average IQ doing better or worse than countries with higher average IQs?

We know correlation doesn't meant causality. We also know that even in terms of IQ tests, you have at least some contextual knowledge requirement...without which your reasoning is impaired relative to competition. You can safely predict a low score implies at least in the short term that a person will struggle. Knowing scores can be improved (to a degree), this directly implies so can people to an extent, including reasoning around contextual knowledge that is learned later and improved health/conditions.

 

[metalhead]

Christianity was founded as an apocalyptic, sectarian cult that viewed its leader as God.

In America it appears to be returning to its roots then.

I mean, this is a pretty silly thing to say, when one thing was founded 2000 years ago, and the other about 60 years ago.

 

[Mouthwash]

In America it appears to be returning to its roots then.

I mean, this is a pretty silly thing to say, when one thing was founded 2000 years ago, and the other about 60 years ago.

Wasn't that about the length of time from Marx to Stalin?

 

[metalhead]

Are we just saying random things now? I love lamp!

 

[cardgame]

Well, #11 is an opinion, so I'm curious how it can be either true or false. Regardless, it isn't accurate - LGBT parents are actually better, usually because they don't have unwanted children. And wanted children are taken better care of. I don't think that's controversial. Studies have been done.

 

[Traitorfish]

Peterson is quite strongly anti-authoritarian, though, and I don't think there's much in what he says that could sustain the far right as a movement.

Anti-authoritarians don't argue that hierarchies are natural or desirable tho

Yeah, I don't get the impression that Peterson is anti-authoritarian so much as he just objects to people telling him, Jordan Peterson, what to do. There's not a strong sense that he has any particular qualms about people telling other people what to do in general. It might make him an awkward authoritarian, even a poor one, but hardly an opponent of authoritarianism. I'm not even sure it's a psychology atypical of the contemporary far-right; for all the flags and salutes, very few of these guys strike me as good soldiers looking for a leader.

Authoritarianism refers to one's attitude towards the state. It would be reasonable to characterize a society of slaveholding households as anti-authoritarian.

I am curious to to know what you think the word "authority" means.

Well, #11 is an opinion, so I'm curious how it can be either true or false. Regardless, it isn't accurate - LGBT parents are actually better, usually because they don't have unwanted children. And wanted children are taken better care of. I don't think that's controversial. Studies have been done.

It's also worth picking up on the fact that although point #11 is overtly homophobic, it isn't just homophobic, because it also functions as an attack on single parents, on multi-generational households, and on co-resident extended families. That these sorts of family arrangements are markedly more prevalent among black, brown and Indigenous people in North America, and among recent immigrants, strikes me as something less than a coincidence.

Whether or not Peterson intended it as an equation of citizenship with straight white householding men, that's certainly how it is going to be read by a substantial part of his audience. "Not racist, but #1 with racists" and all that.

 

[Lexicus]

Authoritarianism refers to one's attitude towards the state. It would be reasonable to characterize a society of slaveholding households as anti-authoritarian.

No it doesn't and no it wouldn't. Chattel slavery is among the most authoritarian social systems possible.

Yeah, I don't get the impression that Peterson is anti-authoritarian so much as he just objects to people telling him, Jordan Peterson, what to do, not that he has any particular qualms about people telling other people what to do in general. It might make him an awkward authoritarian, even a poor one, but hardly an opponent of authoritarianism. I'm not even sure it's a psychology atypical of the contemporary far-right; for all the flags and salutes, very few of these guys strike me as good soldiers looking for a leader.

Well, I certainly wouldn't argue against the idea that most of the people on the alt-right sort of envision themselves as autocrats. But of course, they can't all be autocrats.

It's also worth picking up on the fact that although point #11 is overtly homophobic, it isn't just homophobic, because it also functions as an attack on single parents, on multi-generational households, and on co-resident extended families. That these sorts of family arrangements are markedly more prevalent among black, brown and Indigenous people in North America, and among recent immigrants, strikes me as something less than a coincidence.

Number 11 is absolutely terrifying to me. It's about three steps from there to branding people who aren't part of "intact heterosexual two-parent families" "antisocial elements" who are a danger to the health and stability of the polity, and shipping them off to camps.

 

[Bootstoots]

College students agree with this too. They mostly just no-platform unabashed racists. The problem, as @Lexicus nearly points out here:


is that modern American conservatism as an ideology was founded on white supremacy. The "progress" Buckley so explicitly described conservatives opposing was racial equality, social acceptance and tolerance of interracial marriage, etc.

He was an avowed white supremacist, and favored violent separation of the races as he wrote in the National Review. The fact that he retconned white supremacy to fit into a more palatable and not-explicitly-racist political ideology is remarkable, but certainly should not be celebrated.

Sure, granted. I don't mean to defend Buckley; I just hold that his views, while racist especially in their earlier form, do differ substantially from David Duke's. I also consider modern conservatism to have more to it than just the segregationism that inspired it in the civil rights era, or the racism of Trump and the alt-right today. The "more" is mostly different types of garbage (e.g. religious stuff, gun rights extremism, supply-side economics), but still.

As for Peterson, I'm somewhat surprised that he seems to be identifying as conservative now. I wonder if this is a new development, and if to some extent the company he's keeping have pulled him right.

Anti-authoritarians don't argue that hierarchies are natural or desirable tho

Yeah, I don't get the impression that Peterson is anti-authoritarian so much as he just objects to people telling him, Jordan Peterson, what to do, not that he has any particular qualms about people telling other people what to do in general. It might make him an awkward authoritarian, even a poor one, but hardly an opponent of authoritarianism. I'm not even sure it's a psychology atypical of the contemporary far-right; for all the flags and salutes, very few of these guys strike me as good soldiers looking for a leader.

He seems to be from a quasi-libertarian strain of conservatism: the type who don't want governments telling people what to do, but who think that hierarchies of competence naturally arise and shouldn't be artificially suppressed. I don't mean by anti-authoritarian that he opposes all forms of authority, just that he would not support government interference with freedom of expression or other civil liberties including those of his opponents.

I've probably watched a few hours of him in total, and at no point did I see anything that struck me as illiberal, or sympathetic to illiberalism. I'm happy to be proven wrong though.

 

[Lexicus]

I've probably watched a few hours of him in total, and at no point did I see anything that struck me as illiberal, or sympathetic to illiberalism. I'm happy to be proven wrong though.

Well, that list of principles from Twitter sure contain a number of points that are totally incompatible with what I think of as liberalism. It's sort of unclear to what extent Peterson agrees with those principles, though.