“The answer lies in the fact that slave labor, in spite of its seeming superiority, was actually not as advantageous as indentured labor the first half of the century. Because of the high mortality among immigrants to Virginia, there could be no great advantage in owning a man for a lifetime rather than a period of years, especially since a slave cost roughly twice as much as an indentured servant. If the chances of a man's dying during his first five years in Viriginia were fifty-fifty – and it seems apparent that they were- and if English servants could be made to work as hard as slaves, English servants for a five-year term were the better buy.”
― American Slavery, American Freedom
― American Slavery, American Freedom
“From being a movement aiming for universal freedom, communism turned into a system of universal despotism. That is the logic of utopia.”
― The Silence of Animals: On Progress and Other Modern Myths
― The Silence of Animals: On Progress and Other Modern Myths
“Our sexually selected instincts for displaying sympathy tend to affect our belief systems, not just our charity and courtship
behavior. When individuals espouse ideological positions, we typically interpret their beliefs as signs of good or bad moral
character. Individuals feel social pressure to adopt the beliefs that are conventionally accepted as indicating a "good heart," even
when those beliefs are not rational. We may even find ourselves saying, "His ideas may be right, but his heart is clearly not in the
right place." Political correctness is one outcome of such attributions. For example, if a scientist says, "I have evidence that human intelligence is genetically heritable," that is usually misinterpreted as proclaiming, "I am a disagreeable psychopath unworthy of love." The arbiters of ideological correctness can
create the impression that belief A must indicate personality trait X. If X is considered sexually and socially repulsive, then belief A
becomes taboo. In this way our sexually selected instincts for moralistic self-advertisement become subverted into ideological dogmas. I think that human rationality consists largely of separating intellectual argument from personality attributions about moral character. Our difficulty in making this separation suggests that political, religious, and pseudo-scientific ideologies have been part of moralistic self-display for a very long time.”
― The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature
behavior. When individuals espouse ideological positions, we typically interpret their beliefs as signs of good or bad moral
character. Individuals feel social pressure to adopt the beliefs that are conventionally accepted as indicating a "good heart," even
when those beliefs are not rational. We may even find ourselves saying, "His ideas may be right, but his heart is clearly not in the
right place." Political correctness is one outcome of such attributions. For example, if a scientist says, "I have evidence that human intelligence is genetically heritable," that is usually misinterpreted as proclaiming, "I am a disagreeable psychopath unworthy of love." The arbiters of ideological correctness can
create the impression that belief A must indicate personality trait X. If X is considered sexually and socially repulsive, then belief A
becomes taboo. In this way our sexually selected instincts for moralistic self-advertisement become subverted into ideological dogmas. I think that human rationality consists largely of separating intellectual argument from personality attributions about moral character. Our difficulty in making this separation suggests that political, religious, and pseudo-scientific ideologies have been part of moralistic self-display for a very long time.”
― The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature
“Sexual selection usually behaves like an insanely greedy tabloid newspaper editor who deletes all news and leaves only advertisements. In human evolution, it is as if the editor suddenly recognized a niche market for news in a few big-brained readers.
She told all her reporters she wanted wall-to-wall news, but she never bothered to set up a fact-checking department. Human ideology is the result: a tabloid concoction of religious conviction, political idealism, urban myth, tribal myth, wishful thinking, memorable anecdote, and pseudo-science.”
― The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature
She told all her reporters she wanted wall-to-wall news, but she never bothered to set up a fact-checking department. Human ideology is the result: a tabloid concoction of religious conviction, political idealism, urban myth, tribal myth, wishful thinking, memorable anecdote, and pseudo-science.”
― The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature
“In all probability, DuBois would not voice surprise at the serious class problem today or its entrenchment in the economic situation, or the impact of the industrial and economic organization and policies employed by the United States upon the underclass. If he were here, he probably would project a kind of social upheaval unparalleled in this country primarily because of the battle of countervailing powers (big labor, big business, big government, and helpless consumers) over slices of the real no-growth economic pie and the powerless position of the sub-groups of income recipients and dependents and the rising strength of organized workers in public and private essential service industries. The economic future of blacks in the United States is bound up with that of the rest of the nation. Policies, programs, and politics designed in the future to cope with the problems of the poor and victimized will also yield benefits to blacks. In contrast, any efforts to treat blacks separately from the rest of the nation are likely to lead to frustrations, heightened racial animosities, and a waste of the country's resources and the precious resources of black people."
Vivian W. Henderson”
― The Declining Significance of Race : Blacks and Changing American Institutions
Vivian W. Henderson”
― The Declining Significance of Race : Blacks and Changing American Institutions
Zach’s 2025 Year in Books
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