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aparition42 -7 points ago +3 / -10

And the overall trend doesn't mean squat to a weak man or a strong woman.

But certain weak men cling to the trend as though other men's strength has anything to do with them.

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RPD2 13 points ago +13 / -0

But society is defined by the average, not by the strongest or weakest exceptions. That's why Africa is still a hell-hole or why highly populated muslim areas even in first world countries are so regressive and ghetto-ish.

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aparition42 1 point ago +2 / -1

Africa is an entire continent. It doesn't have a singular society or culture. By simply combining them together and calling it all a hell-hole because of the worst parts, you hide why some groups are doing just fine while others are struggling.

Averaging destroys data. It obscures WHY some individuals are better than the average and why others fall below it. Falsely applying the average of arbitrarily chosen demographic attributes to individual outcomes and presuming this shows genetics as a causal factor is a fatalist view which denies the individual's ability to affect their own situation.

If you take the same argument and apply it to 1500s England you could make the claim that the peasant class was simply genetically incapable of learning to read while the inbred royals were the genetically predetermined intellectual elite.

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RPD2 2 points ago +2 / -0

Averaging destroys data. It obscures WHY some individuals are better than the average and why others fall below it.

With ideal information sure. But sometimes, the average is all we have. When we invite people into the US, we can't know their history, or their past crimes (which they can easily lie about). We can't know if they're going to build successful enterprises, or whether they'll fall flat on their face.

Sometimes we have to take chances, and the average for a demographic is part of that assessment. Especially when we have little other data to go by.

Same with an employer when he's hiring someone. He can't know the true intelligence, creativity, or work ethic of a potential employee. He can only go by gut extinct and, that amazing thing we call the 'average'.

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aparition42 2 points ago +2 / -0

If you're hiring people based on "average" and not based on individuals' resumes, interviews, and trial work, then you're not going to succeed in any business. It is the individual that matters.

Regardless, the topic at hand is about orchestral music, not mass immigration where the problem is that there's NO restriction average OR individual. I wouldn't want uncontrolled immigration from England any more than I want it from Mogadishu. The fact of the matter is, even from the most successful first world nation, it usually isn't going to be the most successful people that are willing to leave what they have to take a chance on coming to America.

That's another area where focusing on the average will give you false information. Who cares if the average of the nation they're coming from is high if it's only the worst individuals from that nation are coming here?