The thought experiments

Submitted by Prometheus 6 on April 11, 2005 - 7:17am.
on

You can tell whether the respondent is Black or white by whether they suggest controlling the environment or controlling the individual.

I'll never get a statistically valid sampling, but I think there's enough to suggest it's true.

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Submitted by dwshelf on April 11, 2005 - 12:02pm.

You can tell whether the respondent is black or white by whether they see economic disparity in terms of individuals or in terms of racial grouping.

I see no real information in grouping me with a deadbeat white, and I don't think of myself being in any such racially defined group.

What information is there in grouping a black professional with a deadbeat black?

Submitted by Prometheus 6 on April 11, 2005 - 1:16pm.

That's a different discussion.

Submitted by Quaker in a Basement on April 11, 2005 - 6:18pm.

Are you sure?

Seems more like a conservative/liberal split to me.

Submitted by Prometheus 6 on April 11, 2005 - 6:40pm.

Okay, rephrase: One group is more concerned with impact on perception of self, the other with perception of environment.

Submitted by James R MacLean on April 11, 2005 - 7:07pm.

I'm actually sort of a bluish gray. My antanae are better now; they're bluish gray too. I had an earth flu and my antanae got all flaccid and orange.

Is the point that Europeans are going to see the environment as the thing they can control, whereas the Africans are going to see this as an obhject lesson in totalitarianism*?

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* Totalitarianism: here, where the state is effectively at war with the governed; in this case, with the African American segment of the governed.

Submitted by Scheherazade (not verified) on April 11, 2005 - 7:11pm.

I had an earth flu and my antanae got all flaccid and orange.

Eeeeeeeeeeewwww! Too much information.

It's true, though. His one eye gets all bleary and his antanae turn a sort of pale yellow-orange.

Submitted by James R MacLean on April 12, 2005 - 2:01pm.

You can tell whether the respondent is Black or white by whether they suggest controlling the environment or controlling the individual.

OR:

One group is more concerned with impact on perception of self, the other with perception of environment.

Which is which? I think you mean, the European Americans are assuming the thought experiment involves an impersonal system of managing the environment? Whereas the African Americans think it's about how one would force individuals to behave? If so, I confess I saw some respondent answer TE1 with what I thought should have belonged in TE2, or vice versa; I saw some emphasize perception; I (who am European American) thought in terms of existing methods of social control.

I think some people saw the TE's as a "compare the reality with the motive of white power" (which is quite compelling). I saw that too, but I thought it would be interesting if I tried to treat it like an economics problem, with a minimax* "solution."
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*minimax: in calculus of variations, the value of a function that gets the maximum or minimum result

Submitted by Prometheus 6 on April 13, 2005 - 10:07am.

I think you mean, the European Americans are assuming the thought experiment involves an impersonal system of managing the environment? Whereas the African Americans think it's about how one would force individuals to behave?

That's pretty much it.

If so, I confess I saw some respondent answer TE1 with what I thought should have belonged in TE2, or vice versa;

Yes I thought so too. But it's still a good initial filter through which to view things.