Genetic Capitalism
This semester I took my fourth class with Professor Ira Carmen: Genetics and Politics. The class required a final paper. Below I have pasted the concluding paragraph of the paper along with my Circular Theory of Genetics and Economics. The entire essay can be downloaded here.
The scientific literature has shown that free markets fit best with human genetics. History shows the violence and inefficiency of attempts to mold human nature against its pre-loaded software. Not all human genes are the same. The composition of gene pools in the countries of the world depends on immigration, climate, geography, and a myriad of other factors. The existence of cross-country genetic diversity suggests that varying shades of free markets should be applied to the various shades of genetic pools. Some countries, like Singapore, properly fit their economic laws with their genetic predisposition for risk and free markets. Other countries, like Japan, have economic laws far freer than the population’s genetic tolerance for risk and economic freedom. The Circular Theory of Genetics and Economics shows the surprising closeness between Marxism and libertarianism in terms of the inefficiency of their fit with human genetics. The lower portion of the circle is a bowl of efficiency bounded by the European Welfare-State on the left and Modern American Capitalism on the right. This bowl represents the approximate range for all genetically efficient economic systems. Economic philosophers have always used abstract speculations on human nature as the basis of their proposed economic systems. Today we have objective scientific measurements of human nature and we should use that knowledge to precisely and scientifically craft economic laws tailoredto the diversity of human genetic pools – Genetic Capitalism.
The entire essay can be downloaded here.
Comment by JAL on 12 December 2008 at 5:44 pm:
Not bad.
You’re still wrong.
Comment by Allan Niemerg on 12 December 2008 at 7:09 pm:
So, Billy’s thesis is that some humans have better genetics for capitalism than others?
Well, that’s fine, but where’s the evidence? Maybe I missed a footnote, but where are the studies linking particular behavioral traits to identified genes? Where are the studies showing a direct linkage between prevalence of those genes in a population and the cultural dispositions of that population? And without such data, how can Billy claim in any way that his theory has anything to do with genetics?
Comment by Michael Kilberry on 12 December 2008 at 7:46 pm:
Billy, i think your idea more focuses on social mores & cultural standards than genetics, but otherwise i think its a very interesting point you make. Now If you rename this paper,remove all references to genetics and replace the word with “cultural/social traits”, you’ll have yourself a very sound argument.
Comment by Brandon on 12 December 2008 at 11:11 pm:
This is entirely stream of consciousness as I read the essay:
Okay, first off don’t they teach you empirical methods in economics? It’s really easy to manipulate data or ask questions in the right way to get the answer you want, that’s why people always look at who funds research; if you come with an agenda, it’s not that hard to “prove” your preconceived idea.
You talk of capitalism as though it’s something new and revolutionary when it’s been around in some form for a good chunk of recorded history. Hell the Phoenicians were proto-capitalists. The Venetians and Athenians all had some form of Capitalism. Economic laws to fit the gene pool? Really? Really? That’s really a dubious assertion man. Culture probably plays a lot bigger a role than genetics. The world has a lot of great examples. Most white Americans are of European ancestry, yet few if any European countries have the same level of worship of the market as Americans do. If it were genetic, we’d expect to see some linkage or parallels between the US and say Britain and Germany. Or geographic variation based on where people tended to come from. Even if you could show an economic though pattern consistent with settlement patterns, there would have to be a way to tease culture out from genetics. I dunno, maybe by raising a group of ‘Murikans in a Zapatista village in the Chiapas.This has an awfully strong echo in the early 20th century notions about race.
Dude Thomas Malthus was trying to justify not helping the poor. His ideas mostly posited that we should do jack shit because it’s going to happen anyway. Not to mention the fact that thusfar Malthus has not been proven particularly right by our advances in food production and the slowing of population growth. Also, if there’s anything to this, current demographic trends are sort of fucking it all up what with rich people having fewer children and all.
O…kay…Consumerism showing up in nature, see the problem here is you’re not defining the word, so we don’t know what you mean. Furthermore, if you want a good analysis of consumption and display Veblen’s “The Theory of the Leisure Class.” He offers a cultural analysis of consumption that is really scary given that it was written almost 100 years ago and sounds like it could have been written in the roaring 90s. The psychology stuff doesn’t raise any glaring red flags.
Hypomanic? Really? You’re one of the lazier people I know, but whatever gets you up in the morning. Halfway through I’m still not seeing anything that strongly indicates your claims stem from genetics rather than culture. The UAI still can’t distinguish the two man. Maybe you were trying to be daring because the culture thing has been done to death, but really this sounds more white man’s burden than cutting edge. It could quite plausibly have absolutely nothing to do with genetics and everything to do with lots of people from different places in one place, often in a relatively hostile environment that pushes their behavior in a certain direction.
“France’s laws already exhibit a genetic intolerance of risk and a yearning for the suckling of the welfare-state” Please, next time just say “The French suck. I’m a Republican and I approve of this message,” it would save us all time.
“Some populations have genetic identities that are more strategically fit to win in the global economic game.” You’re starting to sound more and more like you support keeping poor nations in their place man . . .
“Given the abundance that humanity has created over the years, even the least genetically efficient populations will survive, but the most genetically fit populations will dominate the game.” Congratulations, you’ve officially entered the territory of race-based superiority. Eugenics by any other name . . .
But really, it all comes down to what Alan said. What gene suggests these traits? Can we find clusters of these genes that conform with the theory? Until then you’re sort of just tossing out a hypothesis without any real way of testing. Really, this is a giant lovefest with American exceptionalism. Next time you should title your theory “America, Fuck Yeah!” Y’know that and proof-read your 20 page term paper.
Comment by Tom Trumpinski on 13 December 2008 at 8:55 am:
I agree 100% with Brandon.
Comment by Joshua on 13 December 2008 at 9:00 am:
BJM – I enjoyed the mini-reviews of previous literature, though in some cases another paragraph would have left a reader new to this area more fulfilled. But ultimately, this wasn’t for a reader new to the area, like all term papers, it had an audience of one, Prof. Ira H. Carmen. And it’s the sort of argument he will love.
Were this a true empirical study, I would largely agree with Brandon, particularly on the lack of defined terms, the leading reasoning, and I may even take some time to punch holes in this reasoning. And I absolutely agree with Michael. Do you think you’re conflating a cultural argument with a genetic one?
The reference to yourself as a hypomaniac wouldn’t belong in any term paper, neither would all the typos, and you should have had enough respect for IHC to give it a better proof read and catch those, there are certainly more than 5, probably more than 10. But both of these are elements IHC will likely look past. Also, I think the drawing is sort of novel, but not well supported.
I think you will get an A or an A- from Ira Carmen. But you would be lucky to get a B from a professor demanding an error free, sound empirical analysis. As much as I love IHC, some of his scholarship has exhibited similarly sloppy reasoning, his paper on Chess algorithms and supreme court decision making is a good example. But I haven’t read enough of his scholarship on genetics and politics to have a good sense of his precision as a scientist in this area.
Comment by Billy Joe Mills on 14 December 2008 at 1:28 pm:
Brandon,
I’m going to respond to Brandon, even though this is really a response to everyone (Allan, Mike, Tom, and Josh), given that you all have similar concerns. First, I’d like to apologize for the numerous typos in the paper. I was exhausted at 4am upon finish this paper and lacked the energy to proofread it.
I agree that it is easy to prove a preconceived notion. The best approach to any question is to build an inductive argument based on the data and evidence. Interestingly, I began this paper with the preconceived notion that something close to American capitalism should be adopted by all countries because of the similarity of genetics across country boundaries. After doing some research and thinking about the subject, I realized the probability that the genetic adaptability to free markets will vary across genetic pools because of population movements and the influence of the various environments of the world on genetic evolution in that arena. So, as far as preconceived notions go, I discarded mine.
This relates to another point that you made, “Really, this is a giant lovefest with American exceptionalism. Next time you should title your theory “’America, Fuck Yeah!’” Again, you would be correct about this if I had stuck with my preconceived notion, namely that every country should adopt something very similar to American capitalism. But that is not my conclusion at all, and frankly, I’m boggled that you could have inferred this to be my conclusion from anything that I wrote. The circular theory makes it pretty clear that I do not consider either Early American Capitalism or Modern American Capitalism to be the best or most efficient modes of capitalism. I think this is rather obvious given that the term “Most Efficient” is at the very bottom of the circle and Modern American Capitalism is to the right of that point. In fact, I placed it (perhaps too generously) symmetrically opposite to the European Welfare-State. So, your interpretation of this as a “giant lovefest with America” is rather bizarre. What’s funny about your accusation of my having preconceived notions is that you were actually the one with preconceived notions. You expected me to worship American capitalism and instead of accurately reading my paper, you instead grafted your preconceived notions, biases, and prejudices of me onto the text of my paper. Hilarious.
I agree with your point that capitalism is nothing “new.” In fact, I made that point in my paper. Howard Bloom arrived as this conclusion, as I describe in my paper, when he discusses the various ways in which insects and animals express traits that correspond well with free markets. I also provided a quote from Gorbachev that said, “The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization.”
The following statement reveals that you missed one of the major points of my paper: “Most white Americans are of European ancestry, yet few if any European countries have the same level of worship of the market as Americans do. If it were genetic, we’d expect to see some linkage or parallels between the US and say Britain and Germany.” The entire discussion of the Hypomanic book answers your point. The theory of that book is that the genetics of immigrants display a disproportionate tolerance for risk. In other words, genetic risk tolerance will be normally distributed throughout the general population and heavily biased in the immigrant population. Having the willingness to take the enormous risk of immigrating to another country implies the genetic tolerance for risk. When a country is a nation of immigrants, like the U.S., it means that our population has essentially been a magnet for the people of the world with the highest genetic tolerance of risk. When you gather all of those people into one country, it means that the base genetic pool of that immigrant country will have a much higher mean and median genetic tolerance for risk than the original countries.
Regarding Malthus, I did not endorse Malthusian thinking. The only thing I said, which was merely a paraphrasing of the article that I cited, is that humans were long stuck in the Malthusian trap of no economic progress. I hardly see this as a wholesale endorsement of Malthus and the fact that you tried to extrapolate my brief mentioning of him into that is intellectually dishonest and sad.
You wrote, “You’re one of the lazier people I know, but whatever gets you up in the morning.” Frankly, you don’t know me that well. You’re basing your comment from your observation of me taking law school classes that did not interest me. I was lazy in those classes. I have devoted an incredible amount of time to classes that I do care about. I also have numerous side projects (music, writing, starting a business, inventing some crazy things, etc.) and I play multiple sports.
Actually, before I wrote this paper, I did believe that the French suck. I thought they had things totally wrong with their welfare-state capitalism. I no longer believe this. I now believe they apply the correct form of capitalism based on the genetics of their population. In fact, my UAI chart suggests they should have an even larger welfare-state. So again, your preconceived notions about what you think I would say are disheartening.
The accusation that I am really talking about culture is understandable for a couple of reasons. First, I gave a shorthand treatment of this subject in the paper when I discussed EO Wilson’s circular Mind-Genetics-Culture theory or Sociobiology. This theory can be read about here: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sociobiology/#2.1. This theory, which has had incredible influence, basically suggests that our social behaviors and our culture are the expression of our genetics, “Sociobiologists claim that many social behaviors have been shaped by natural selection for reproductive success, and they attempt to reconstruct the evolutionary histories of particular behaviors or behavioral strategies.” Wilson, who is essentially the most influential biologist/entomologist of all time, proposes that mind, genetics, and culture are all interlinked and inter-influential upon each other. I personally read Wilson and the subsequent conclusions of sociobiology to mean that given that culture cannot exist before genetics that our genetics created our culture. Our culture is an expression of our genetics. We can learn something about our genetics by studying our culture and we can learn something about our culture by studying our genetics. I admit that the UAI metric is a rough indicator of genetic tolerance for risk and not methodologically optimal, but I wanted to make an attempt to show whether countries are properly matching their economic laws with the genetics of their population. That was my best attempt given the time constraints.
Now on to your most troubling comments: “You’re starting to sound more and more like you support keeping poor nations in their place man . . .” Wow. This could not be more wrong. First, I don’t suggest that countries that are currently poor are that way because of their genetics. They are poor because of many reasons and I don’t see any of them having to do with their genetics. My theory says that all human genetics should align with some form of capitalism that is roughly outlined by the bowl of efficiency at the bottom of the circle that is bounded by the European Welfare-State on the left and Modern American Capitalism on the right. Whether countries are poor or rich today does not predict the efficiency of their capitalist genetics. I do believe that some forms of capitalism are more fit to dominate the world economic game than others. Given that some genetic pools will be more correlated with that form of capitalism than others (if lawmakers follow my suggestion of matching economic laws to the genetics of their people), it will mean that some gene pools will be more likely to dominate the global economic game in the long-run. I don’t have any opinion on whether in the long-run those countries will be European, African, Asian, or whatever. In fact, if you take my circular theory literally, it means that European Welfare-State capitalism and Modern American Capitalism are the LEAST fit forms of capitalism in the long-run! Of course, this is debatable and highly influenced by the recent financial crisis.
To clarify, here is my theory: Human genetics most efficiently fit with a capitalist system of economics; however, because of demographic movements (like immigration), environment and historical events not all gene pools are identical. This means that countries should adopt varying shades of capitalism depending on the genes of their population. Some forms of capitalism will be more strategically fit than others, but only by marginal amounts. I was wrong to use the word “dominate,” because I sincerely believe all forms of capitalism to be relatively equal.
Genetics is the scientific study of what philosophers and economists have always discussed: human nature. Now, however, we don’t need to speculate as much about human nature, we can scientifically observe it. The fact that you would try to label what I wrote as “Eugenics” is disgusting and it really pisses me off. The study of our genes is important into understanding who we are. The fact that you would hurl antiquated accusation of Eugenics is hateful of scientific progress and understanding. Discussing these issues is important, though I realize they raise sensitive issues. The study of sociobiology, the influence of genetics on social behavior, is where the social sciences are going whether you like it or not and regardless of whether you find it offensive. Your prejudices and preconceived notions of what you thought I would say are pernicious, sad, and dangerous. I don’t appreciate your accusations.
Comment by GTL on 14 December 2008 at 2:36 pm:
ouchhh. Brandon just got torn apart. it’s pretty clear that billy joe mills has thought about these issues in a lot more depth than you have. i would just apologize and repent, if i were you.
Comment by Brandon on 14 December 2008 at 2:53 pm:
I’m glad you don’t appreciate what you think I said. It was meant to be deconstructionist, to pick at the edges of the argument and see where it goes. Okay, first off I wasn’t writing a solid, sealed critique, I fully admitted it was entirely stream of consciousness and involved absolutely no revision as I read further. I literally took it argument by argument, not as a whole.
You are quite correct that you did give some answer to the question of demographic and geographic similarities. Conceded. If what you say is true about the people who left, then we should not expect to see much correlation. Your response still doesn’t suggest that there are natural winners and losers on the economic scene. In fact, extrapolating to its most logical conclusion would indeed suggest exactly what I implied you were suggesting – that countries/cultures that are at the bottom are there because their genes are not as capitalistically adapted and can never be expected to rise beyond their genetic upward limit.
See I could go on and on, but your theory lacks even a half-assed attempt at a disaggregation of culture from genetics. Really, that’s the chief critique and always has been. You can take issue with my commentary on your paper, but 1) you put it online and you knew it was controversial, expect to hear about it 2) I don’t think you’re a racist, but I do think you don’t realize how you can come off sounding to an audience that isn’t Billy Joe Mills. Much of what I was commenting on had little to do with what I thought you were saying so much as how it came across at first blush having never heard this before.
By the way, it’s not a theory. It’s not even a hypothesis because none of the authors offered a way to test it. They offered a lot of statistics and suggested correlations which is fine and can be the basis of a hypothesis, but for the time being it’s more of a scientific concept.
That aside, you probably should have taken a bit of time to develop why capitalism and not something else. You treated it briefly, but you could really stand to explain more about why/how libertarianism and socialism are less efficient. You wanted to be daring, good. Be daring. Just don’t be sloppy.
Comment by Brandon on 14 December 2008 at 2:54 pm:
Ah the third sentence of my last comment should read “Your response still DOES suggest that there are natural winners and losers on the economic scene.”
Comment by Billy Joe Mills on 14 December 2008 at 4:04 pm:
I’m not objective to you criticizing me. I appreciate criticism. I don’t appreciate unproductive insinuations that I’m a eugenicist and I am akin to Rudyard Kipling.
Again, I think the culture objection is a valid on but I feel it is adequately taken care of by Wilson’s Sociobiology. If I’m right about that, then you’re objecting to Wilson and not to me…and honestly, you just don’t want to mess with Wilson: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.O._Wilson
Comment by Billy Joe Mills on 14 December 2008 at 7:33 pm:
sorry, i meant to write, “I’m not objecting to you criticizing me…”
Comment by Tom Trumpinski on 18 December 2008 at 4:27 pm:
I’d take being akin to Rudyard Kipling as the greatest of compliments.